Auburn coach gets a taste of home
STILLWATER — The phone call was hard to make for Melissa Luellen and a shock to receive for Courtney Jones.
More than 15 years later, the two can look back and laugh about the day they were on the phone with each other, both crying, after Luellen — then Melissa McNamara — broke the news that she was leaving her position as the golf coach at the University of Tulsa.
“It was the very last week in July, and I was supposed to come to Tulsa in about three weeks,” said Jones, the Oklahoma State coach who Luellen had recruited to Tulsa from Lake Quivira, Kansas. “To an 18-year-old at the time, it’s like, ‘Oh my gosh!’ You put so much into the recruiting process and getting to know who you’re hopefully going to get to play for.”
Luellen, now the women’s coach at Auburn, hasn’t forgotten the pain of the moment, either.
“That was a horrible phone call,” said Luellen, who was leaving Tulsa for Arizona State in 2002. “She and I both bawled on the phone.”
Though Jones never played a single round of golf for Luellen, the bond they built during the recruiting process laid the foundation for a friendship that has carried forward.
Luellen picked Jones’ brain about OSU’s Karsten Creek Golf Club before the NCAA women’s golf championships began, and Jones offered some local restaurant suggestions.
Luellen has been one of Jones’ mentors in the coaching world, along with Luellen’s mother, legendary Tulsa coach Dale McNamara.
“When I came to the realization that I really wanted to get into coaching, Melissa was one of the first people I called,” Jones said. “I’ve always given her a hard time that she left us at Tulsa, but I really enjoy Melissa. I think she’s a really good coach, and I really look up to both Dale and Melissa, not just as players, but as coaches.
“I always enjoy when we get to catch up.”
Luellen was a threetime high school state champion at Jenks before starring for her mother at Tulsa. She went on to a successful professional career that included an LPGA Tour victory.
McNamara, who has been heavily involved in volunteer work in Tulsa since retiring from coaching in 2000, is spending the week in Stillwater, watching her daughter coach Auburn in the tournament.
“She’s staying nearby,” Luellen said of her mother. “She’s got the most adorable driver, a young man who is one of the volunteers. His brother plays football at Tulsa, so they’ve been chitty-chatting. She’s like, ‘I think I have a new son that I never had.’ She’s having a ball.”
After Luellen’s flight arrived in Tulsa earlier in the week, she immediately went to her mother’s house for lunch.
“I love Oklahoma and it’s really nice to be here,” Luellen said. “It’s just nice to have those special touches that we don’t normally have the opportunity for.”
Auburn’s season ended Sunday, coming out on the wrong side of a tiebreaker for the final spot when the field was cut to 15 teams.
But Luellen will be back in Oklahoma soon. She and her mother will be honored next month as the female co-recipients of the Henry P. Iba Citizen Athlete Award in Tulsa.
“It’s amazing. I didn’t probably understand the prestige of the award, then I looked up the former winners and I just about fell out of my chair,” Luellen said. “I feel like I’m the tagalong. I feel like my mom is the one — if it weren’t for my mom, there’s no way I would be included. So I’m just honored to be the tag-along and included. It’s such an honor and we’re just in awe of it, really.”