Peggy Kirby has spent 17 years leading the Augustana women’s golf team. Earlier this year, the nine-time Conference Coach of the Year announced her retirement at the conclusion of the 2019-20 season. The end of her career wasn’t as she imagined with COVID-19 canceling the remainder of the season, but GoAugie.com had a chance to chat with Coach Kirby to talk about her favorite moments over the past 17 years.

She noted that it is impossible to highlight just a few memories as she could talk about every student-athlete she had coached. In typical Coach Kirby fashion, she started with academics as her golf teams were student-athletes.

“The statistics are staggering,” Kirby said regarding everything her teams have accomplished. “That’s the number one reason students want to come to Augustana, they have student success and athletic success follows that.” 

During Kirby’s tenure, she coached 56 All-Academic award winners between the NSIC and NCC, eight CoSIDA Academic All-District honorees and 36 All-America Scholar athletes as sponsored by the Women’s Golf Coaches Association.

“Not only are they great players, but they are super great students,” Kirby added.

Moving to the athlete portion, Kirby noted that Carley Roach was instrumental in helping to jumpstart the Viking golf program.

“Carley was the first student-athlete that I recruited, and hoped that she would help build a program,” Kirby said. “She absolutely did that.

“She won regionals and was my first student-athlete to go to the NCAA Championships which was in Grand Rapids, Michigan, that year. I got to take her as an individual and that was a huge highlight. After watching her for four days in Grand Rapids, that was going to be our goal, to make it to what I call The Big Dance (NCAA Championships).”

Kirby guided the Vikings to the championships as a team for the first time in 2008 and totaled 10 team championship appearances.

Part of getting ready to play in National Championships was Kirby’s desire to prepare her team by playing golf courses all around the United States, which created experiences for the team.

“The golf courses we played, the people we met, and my husband, Kevin, always reminded me that it isn’t about the golf,” Kirby said. “It’s about the experiences. We saw so many parts of the country, I added up 24 states that we got to be in.

“Some of the highlights were always Palm Desert, California, for Spring Break, then Monterey Pebble Beach. We were in Florida, North Carolina, Kentucky, Texas, Arizona, the list goes on and on.”

Kirby talked about how going to the courses served dual purposes.

“It was to prepare them for a National Championship, but we also went to the National Previews and they were always in big places. It was really a bonus to take them to those places.”

It was at this point in the conversation that Kirby shifted gears and said she couldn’t have done any of the coaching on her own, thanking all of her assistants.

“It takes a team effort,” Kirby said. “I couldn’t have done any of this without all my assistants, Patty Coddington, Coralee Jorgensen and Karri Spear.

“I get the title of head coach, but they were there with me every step of the way. I’m so grateful to them, helping me along on my journey to be a head coach.”

Kirby was also quick to point out the parents of all of her student-athletes.

“The support of the families, to me, is just another reason why we were so successful. They totally invested in their student and were also financially supportive of the program.

“That helped us get to the Houston’s, the Palm Springs, the Monterey Bay, and their support was just unbelievable. When I recruited their daughters, I told them we’d all be one big family. And that is how it is today.”

Making it a family affair, Kirby’s husband Kevin was part of the crew as was Randy Derheim, who both served as van drivers throughout the years.

As Coach Kirby reflected on her time as the leader of the Augustana Women’s Golf Program, she revealed she has a journal that she kept from every tournament. 

“I journal every experience and the memories, all the silly things in the van and all the things that happened to certain teams,” Kirby added. “It was really fun to go through those memories.

“I could go on and on.”

As the conversation wrapped up, Coach Kirby again turned her attention to the academic portion of the student-athlete while talking about her greatest joy.