Women’s golf aims for new mentality

Patricia Carpenter

Sacramento State women’s golf coach David Sutherland turned to a new technique this season to strengthen the women’s mentality during competition.

Sutherland enlisted the help of Sac State psychology professor Cindy Long-Nicholson to meet with the women as a group to help prepare them for challenges in upcoming tournaments.

Long-Nicholson was recommended by Sac State women’s gymnastics head coach Kim Hughes, because of her success she has had with his team and other Hornet athletes.

“Cindy is terrific and speaks a language that the women understand; she doesn’t mince words with them,” Sutherland said.

Long-Nicholson analyzes the athletes’ thought processes and finds different strategies to help eliminate outside distractions.

“In the group sessions we talk about what is controllable and what is uncontrollable,” Long-Nicholson said. “(The women) only have limited energy and limited thought space.”

Because golf is such a time-demanding sport, with a range of four to 10 hour tournaments, Long-Nicholson said it is almost impossible to keep an athlete focused for the entire duration.

“It’s a lot of time to think about what’s not going well,” Long-Nicholson said. “It’s a tough sport with the time component.”

Sutherland said he understands the women have a million different things in their lives pulling them into different directions, but knows Long-Nicholson will be able to help pinpoint what things need to be in control while competing on the course.

“Our event we played in while in Arizona, it was 45 degrees and raining for two hours in the first round, yet, the gals did really well,” Sutherland said. “They stayed really competitive, committed and didn’t allow those things to distract them.”

During the Hornets season, each player has been critical of themselves and their performance after discussing how each felt after coming off of tournament play. The team goal is to correct how it thinks and to have a positive mindset.

Senior Lisa Persson is no stranger to collegiate competition, but acknowledged she needs to be mentally tougher out on the course.

“We just talked to these mental coaches and we’ve never done that before,” Persson said. “That’s the main thing I’m trying to focus on right now (is how) to improve my game.”

The common mistake the women said they experience is losing focus when they get frustrated. Persson said Long-Nicholson has introduced visualizing success to help produce positive outcomes.

“While hitting the shot, you’re only supposed to have one thought, to put yourself in what you should do in that moment basically,” Persson said.

Senior Tiffany Nichols said this is not her first time meeting with a psychologist. The Hornet golfers have completed two group sessions, but have also decided to meet with Long-Nicholson individually.

“As a team it is beneficial because it teaches us how to perform as (one),” ” Nichols said.

“Golf is an individual sport and it can make it difficult to make it a team sport.”

Long-Nicholson has been able to make the team cohesive in having the team work together and encourage each other to stay competitive.

Junior Sagee Palavivatana said she was struggling to keep a strong mentality during play, which caused unusually high scores this season.

“In practice it has been helping so far,” Palavivatana said. “I’m just hoping it will transfer over from practice to play. (Long-Nicholson) is helping me figure out the little mistakes I’m making and how I can prepare next time.”

If the Hornets believe improving their thought process will allow the team’s confidence to get better, which is an important part of the game the women are working toward.