ATHENS, Ga. — Andrea Gaston, one of women’s college golf’s most successful coaches ever, has joined the Georgia Golf program as a volunteer coach. Gaston, who won three NCAA team titles and coached five NCAA individual champions at Southern California, will work with the Bulldogs while assistant coach Ember Holloway is on maternity leave.
Gaston spent 22 seasons at USC from 1996-18, where she also won four Pac-12 titles and was named Pac-12 and National Coach of the Year three times. Brewer worked with Gaston while he served as an assistant coach for Southern California’s women’s and men’s golf programs from 2008-12 before becoming the Bulldogs’ head coach.
“I’d like to duplicate the success we had together at USC and maybe even go one step further,” head coach Josh Brewer said. “We had some amazing runs at the national championships. We look at it as we’re adding truly one of the three greatest coaches in women’s college golf. We’re very excited to have those ears and eyes as part of our program. And when Ember comes back, it gives us three amazing coaches for the most important part of the year.”
Under Gaston, USC qualified for the NCAA Championships 21 years in a row. Gaston guided the Trojans to NCAA titles in 2003, 2008 and 2013 and top-5 finishes during each of her last 13 years in Los Angeles. During that span, no other school had more than eight top-5 efforts. Individually, NCAA medalists Jennifer Rosales (1998), Mikaela Parmlid (2003), Dewi Claire Schreefel (2006), Annie Park (2103) and Doris Chen (2014) headline a list of 21 of Gaston’s USC golfers who earned a combined 51 All-American honors.
The Trojans finished first or second at the NCAA Championships seven times under Gaston, including second-place finishes by one stroke in 2010 and 2012 – with Brewer on staff – and by two strokes in 2014. The Trojans were one of two schools nationally to reach match play at the NCAA Championships in the first four seasons after the current format was adopted in 2015, and USC made the semifinals in three of those four seasons.
A 2010 inductee into the Women’s Golf Coaches Association’s Hall of Fame, Gaston spent three seasons as the head coach at Texas A&M from 2018-21. In her first year in College Station, she led the Aggies to their 19th straight NCAA Regional appearance and helped every golfer in the lineup improve their average by at least .75 strokes per round.
Prior to entering the coaching ranks at USC in 1996, Gaston was a highly acclaimed amateur and professional player. She competed for San Jose State in the 1970s, finishing in the top 10 of the national championships and qualifying for the 1977 U.S. Women’s Open. After a 14-year hiatus to focus on a business career, Gaston returned to the game, qualifying for the 1994 U.S. Women’s Open and winning two California State Amateur championships (1993-94).
Gaston completed her education at California State University, Northridge, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in physical education in 1980. She has served on numerous committees over the years, including the NCAA Certification Committee, WGCA Awards Committee, Collegiate Golf Foundation Coaches Council, the National Tour Committee and the MasterCard Collegiate Golf Rankings Committee.