Former UT golfer Betsy Rawls remembered for lifelong impact she made on golf, the LPGA

University of Texas product Betsy Rawls, a four-time U.S. Women’s Open champion, died Saturday at the age of 95. One of the most prolific winners in golf, she transitioned from a playing career to tournament administrator in 1975, greatly impacting the LPGA both inside and outside the ropes.

Rawls won 55 times on the LPGA, including eight majors. Only Kathy Whitworth (88), Mickey Wright (82), Annika Sorenstam (72), Louise Suggs (61) and Patty Berg (60) won more.

“There are simply not many careers that can compare to Betsy’s,” said USGA CEO Mike Whan in a release. “Fifty-five wins, eight major titles, LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame, former LPGA president, Bob Jones Award winner. She was a legend in the game who would have been successful in anything she pursued, so we are all lucky she made golf her passion. RIP to a true champion.”

Rawls shares the record of four U.S. Women’s Open titles with her good friend Wright. They kept up with each other until Wright’s death in 2020.

Rawls, who hit whiffle balls in the backyard into her 90s, didn’t take up golf until age 17 and turned professional not long after earning a degree in physics from Texas. She found the college academic experience helpful when it came to how well she could focus inside the ropes.

Rawls learned the game from Harvey Penick, whose instruction was so legendary he wound up in the World Golf Hall of Fame. And in 1977, the Texas Invitational golf tournament was renamed to honor Rawls, although that event hasn’t been played since 2020.

After finishing runner-up to Babe Zaharias at the 1950 U.S. Women’s Open, Rawls beat Suggs by five strokes the following year to claim her first Women’s Open title. Rawls won the money title in 1952 and 1959, when she won a then-record 10 times in one season. She also won the Vare Trophy for low scoring average in ’59.

In the early days of the LPGA, top players were asked to do far more than tee it up. Rawls served as secretary shortly after joining the tour and became tour president in 1961. As a touring pro for Wilson Sporting Goods, she traveled the country with Berg conducting more than 100 golf clinics each year.

After retiring from the tour in 1975, Rawls served as the tour’s tournament director and eventually took the helm of the LPGA Championship (now KPMG Women’s PGA Championship). She became the first woman to serve on the USGA’s rules committee in 1976, and in 1980 she became the first woman to officiate at a U.S. Open Championship.

“I think by nature, I’m pretty compulsive,” Rawls said in 2000 of what it takes to run a successful event. “I think that helps. And as I expect everything to be perfect, I had a hard time tolerating anything that’s not done well.”

"Betsy Rawls was an extraordinary person who led an extraordinary life," Longhorns women's golf coach Ryan Murphy said. "Her record was Hall of Fame worthy and her legacy is one that helped shape women's golf as we know it today. We lost a giant and we lost a Longhorn legend today. Our prayers and condolences go out to the Rawls family and to all of Betsy's friends around the country."

Birdies and bogeys

Q-School update: The second stage of LPGA Q-School took place last week in Venice, Fla., and of the 188 who started the week, 41 advanced. Among those 41 were nine amateurs at Plantation Golf and Country Club’s Bobcat and Panther courses. Last year, the LPGA changed its Q-Series criteria, requiring players to turn professional before they can compete for an LPGA card. The deadline for players to sign up for Q-Series as a professional is 4 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 17. Among those who have a decision to make is Sabrina Iqbal, a 2022 TCU graduate who set the program’s career scoring record at 72.9, birdies with 357 and rounds of par or better with 59. The Californian then transferred to Colorado for a fifth year. She’s 116th in WAGR. Iqbal also played in the second stage last year and took a share of 102nd. Also, Texas A&M super senior Jennie Park jumped up 15 spots on the leaderboard with a closing 69. Park led the Aggies last year with a 71.72 stroke average. This year’s LPGA Q-Series takes place Nov. 30 to Dec. 5 in Mobile, Ala., at the Magnolia Grove Golf Course.

Crushers crush: SMU product Bryson DeChambeau led his LIV Golf team, Crushers GC, to the team title and the $14 million top prize at the season-ending event last weekend. The low man for the low team was Anirban Lahiri, who shot a bogey-free 7-under 65 in the final round. DeChambeau was two shots behind at 5-under 67, with Charles Howell III at even and Paul Casey at 1 over. “It was very nerving wracking. Finishing it off, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, I was super nervous not knowing what could happen,” said DeChambeau. “Everybody was in flux, and I wasn’t driving it particularly my best. I did it very well on the front nine, but the back nine didn’t do it as well, and it’s one of those things that I was just trying to hit the best shot I possibly could. I was super nervous. I couldn’t feel my arms over the ball on the last hole.”

Frazar wins: UT product Harrison Frazar won his first PGA Tour Champions event Sunday, edging Richard Green in a sudden-death playoff at the Dominion Energy Charity Classic. Frazar’s lone win came in 2011 in the Callaway Golf Pebble Beach Invitational, an event that featured golfers from the PGA Tour, LPGA, Champions and the then-Nationwide Tour. “It’s been a long time, long time coming,” an emotional Frazar said after his victory. “You think your career’s over and, you know, through faith and through friends and through people who believe in you, you know, you decide to pick it up again because you feel like there’s a void. And the void is this: The void is competing; the void is missing that win. It’s the nerves, it’s all the stuff. It’s scary, but it’s fun. You can never replace it. So yeah, it’s emotional. You just don’t know if you’re ever going to get there again, and when you do, it feels good.”

Tim Schmitt is the managing editor for Golfweek, golf coordinator for the USA Today Network and lives in Round Rock. Beth Ann Nichols contributed to this report.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Former Texas Longhorns, LPGA golfer Betsy Rawls died at age 95