Peggy Kirby, outstanding amateur golfer and head coach of Augustana's women's golf team, was inducted into the South Dakota Sports Hall of Fame Saturday night during a banqet held at the Sioux Falls Convention Center.
Kirby, who was inducted into the state golf Hall of Fame in 2005, was inducted along with seven other people at the organization's annual banquet.
A Sioux Falls native, Kirby won the South Dakota women's stroke play championship five times – 1973, 1974, 1975, 1977, 1982 – and the Sioux Falls city tournament 17 times. She had a three-year reign as state junior champion. She and her husband,
Kevin Kirby, won the state husband/wife golf crown in 1994, and she teamed with
Patty Coddington, now her assistant coach with the Vikings, to win the state two-woman title in 2001. In 1973 she was named Female Athlete of the Year by the South Dakota Sportswriters Association.
She played collegiately at Arizona State, where she helped the Sun Devils capture the 1975 NCAA championship.
Now in her sixth year as Augustana's women's golf coach, she has transformed the Vikings into one of the top programs in NCAA Division II, culminating with the program's first appearance in the Division II national tournament in 2008. The Vikings won their first-ever North Central Conference title in 2007.
Augustana's Carley Roach won the NCC title in 2005 and became just the second player in NCC history to be a four-year selection to the all-conference women's first team.
"Coach Kirby is truly a class act,” said Roach. “It is no surprise to me that she is receiving this honor. She really is the face of South Dakota women's golf. She has accomplished so much as a player and is now shaping so many young ladies into great golfers and even better young women. I am so grateful for all she has done for me and the Augustana women's golf program."
The Hall of Fame was established by the South Dakota Sportswriters Association in 1968 and is now an independent non-profit organization. The latest inductions bring the Hall's membership to 195.
