Mid-major Eastern Michigan is acting like a blue blood ahead of first NCAA Regional
Eastern Michigan invested in its golf programs, and its women's team is now competing with the blue bloods as a mid-major.
Josh Brewer was contemplating retirement. Two years ago Saturday, Brewer was fired after 12 years as the Georgia women's golf coach. Brewer, then 48, has spent most of his life coaching after a playing career at Indiana.
But after missing the NCAA Championship by on shot, the Bulldogs decided to go in a different direction, and Brewer thought the same about his career, too. That's when the phone rang. It was a call from Ypsilanti, Michigan.
"I was talking to GameAbove during the interview, and they're like, 'Think different,'" Brewer said. "I've always valued that as a coach. I came from the business world before coaching, so I've always felt like I am different than coaches.
"I thought it would be fun to take over a program ranked 226th and see if we could get it to this point. " In the age of college athletics where universities are eliminating their golf programs in cost-cutting efforts, Eastern Michigan has done the opposite. With the support of GameAbove, a privately held global investment company focused on sports, entertainment and giving and run by a group of EMU alumni, the Eagles have one of the biggest NIL budgets in the sport and are playing on the level of a Power 4 program instead of a mid-major.
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