Contact Information - b.montigel@tcu.edu | (817) 257-7646
One of the most-decorated coaches in TCU Athletics history, Bill Montigel begins his 23rd season as head men's golf coach and 31st overall season as a member of the Horned Frog family. Since becoming the leader of the men's golf program, Montigel has elevated the Frogs into a position of national prominence and the model for building one of the top collegiate golf programs in the country.
During his tenure as the leader of the Horned Frogs' program, Montigel has guided the Purple and White to eight conference championships, including their first-ever Mountain West Conference crown during the 2008-09 campaign. Prior to the Frogs' victory at the Mountain West Conference Championships, Montigel led the Frogs to five consecutive league titles from 2001-05 in two separate conferences (Western Athletic Conference and Conference USA), which set an all-time sport record at TCU.
Even more amazing than the five consecutive conference championships, the Frogs captured four straight Conference USA gold medals in only four years as members of their former conference affiliate. In each of the four seasons that the Frogs were members of Conference USA, Montigel guided his team to a conference title by an average of 12.25 strokes per championship, including a margin of 26 strokes at the 2005 Conference USA Championships.
The Frogs continued their success from Conference USA over to the Mountain West Conference where the Purple and White earned a top-three finish in each of the last three campaigns, including the 2009 Mountain West Conference Championship. The Frogs accomplished an incredible feat during the 2009 Mountain West Conference Championships where TCU overcame the biggest stroke deficit in conference tournament history after being down by eight strokes to San Diego State with five holes remaining.
After coming back to tie the Aztecs at the end of 54 holes, the two programs went to a sudden death playoff hole where the Frogs captured a 3-under-par score compared to 2-under-par for San Diego State en route to claiming the conference crown. The Frogs' first three golfers - Alexander Knappe, Tom Hoge and Travis Woolf - all birdied the playoff hole while James Sacheck came up big for the Frogs with a par to seal the gold medal for TCU.
For his efforts, Montigel was selected as the Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year for the first time in his career, but more impressive was that he became the first coach in the country (of any sport) to earn Conference Coach of the Year accolades in four separate NCAA Division I conferences (Southwest Conference, Western Athletic Conference, Conference USA and Mountain West Conference).
In addition, Montigel led the Frogs to their 20th consecutive NCAA Central Regional Championship appearance and became one of four coaches in the country to take their programs to 20 or more straight regional championships. Montigel joined a small and very elite fraternity of coaches in Florida's Buddy Alexander, Clemson's Larry Penley and UNLV's Dwaine Knight to have all accomplished this feat. The Frogs also became one of 15 programs in all of NCAA Division I men's golf to reach 20 consecutive NCAA Regional Championship appearances.
In a season for the ages, Montigel led a team that was ranked 62nd in the country before the beginning of the season to a final ranking of 12th in the country - a move of 50 spots, which was the largest leap among all NCAA Division I programs this season. The Frogs accomplished this feat despite fielding one of the youngest squads in the country with a lineup that consisted of only one senior, one junior, two sophomores and two freshmen.
The national recognition was well-deserved for the Frogs as the Purple and White recorded a fourth-place showing at the NCAA Central Regional Championships en route to advancing to the NCAA National Championships for the first time since the 2004 campaign. At the NCAA National Championships, the Frogs came within four strokes of advancing to Match Play as TCU finished tied for ninth overall, which was its highest finish since a seventh-place showing at the 1997 NCAA National Championships.
Montigel watched this season as Hoge had a stellar performance for the Frogs at the 2009 NCAA National Championships as the TCU sophomore posted a third-place finish. The Fargo, N.D., standout recorded a 3-under-par score of 210 (70-70-70) over the 54 holes of competition and led by two strokes heading into the final nine holes of action before falling just short of the number-one and number-two players in the country - an impressive feat for a golfer ranked 125th in the country.
At the NCAA National Championships, the Frogs made their way from 15th-place after the first round of action to almost earning a spot in the Elite Eight of collegiate golf by the end of 54 holes, which once again showed the fighting spirit of the young TCU squad. Being in contention in the final round became nothing new for the Frogs as TCU claimed three conference championships (The Prestige at PGA West, Columbia Invitational and Mountain West Conference Championships) in addition to setting a program record with 11 top-five showings in 13 tournaments this past season.
Since joining the Mountain West Conference four seasons ago, the Frogs have continued to make a name for themselves as the most dominant team in the league, which was evident during the 2008-09 campaign when the Purple and White recorded a 20-2-1 record against conference foes. In addition, the Frogs had a pair of All-Americans in James Sacheck and Johan de Beer as both earned honorable mention All-American laurels by the GCAA.
Montigel's rise in the collegiate golf ranks has been well-chronicled from a coach who started out with limited exposure to this particular collegiate sport to becoming one of the most successful coaches in the country. While Montigel's coaching approach has proven to be solid, it was his arrival upon the collegiate golf coaching scene that perhaps raised a few eyebrows.
Prior to the 1987 campaign, the energetic coach's career took a dramatically-altered path as he served eight seasons as an assistant basketball coach and top recruiter at TCU under legendary coach Jim Killingsworth. Several of Montigel's recruiting gems were key performers on the Frogs' back-to-back Southwest Conference championship squads in 1986 and 1987.
One of Montigel's prized recruits was a player that nobody in the country was recruiting in a Hollywood, Calif., guard named Jamie Dixon. The under-sized guard went on to lead the Frogs to a pair of Southwest Conference championships and was inducted into the TCU Lettermen's Association Hall of Fame in 2007. Currently, the fomer TCU standout is considered one of the top minds in all of collegiate basketball as the head coach of nationally-ranked University of Pittsburgh.
When Killingsworth retired, the TCU administration had to look no further than the men's basketball office to find its next men's golf coach. As a graduate student at Oklahoma State, it was Montigel's friendship with legendary Cowboys' golf coach and current OSU Athletics Director - Mike Holder - that truly kindled his interest in golf.
Knowing he could recruit, organize and motivate, the TCU head men's golf coach added some of the valuable lessons he learned in basketball and applied them towards building and maintaining a top-ranked golf program with the Frogs.
Through the years, Montigel has carefully recruited top student-athletes to the TCU program, and, in addition, he has improved the playing schedule for the Purple and White so it ranks among the most difficult in the country. As a result of his committed efforts, the Frogs have been a mainstay among the top-25 in the national polls for more than two decades.
It took Montigel just three seasons to turn a mediocre program into a contender at the conference, regional and national levels as the Frogs have qualified for the NCAA Regional Championships every season since 1990 and advanced to the NCAA Championships on 10 occasions under his guidance.
In his first 14 campaigns, the Frogs captured nine tournaments - an impressive feat considering the lofty competition. However; in the new millennium, the Purple and White has been even more dominant under Montigel's watchful eye as the Frogs have captured 16 team titles in just eight seasons. In addition, the individual victories have increased as 14 Frogs have claimed tournament titles since the 2001 season.
During the 2008-09 campaign, the Frogs had two individuals capture tournament championships in de Beer and Hoge, but was even more impressive was that it took these two standouts fewer than eight collegiate tournaments to be crowned champions. De Beer became the fastest golfer in program history to capture an individual tournament crown as he won The Prestige at PGA West in his second collegiate tournament.
In the very next tournament, Hoge captured the individual championship at the Columbia University Invitational in only his seventh collegiate tournament. Once again, Montigel set another milestone this past season as he became the only coach in the country to have two separate individual golfers capture their first-ever tournament championship in under eight collegiate starts.
Finding and evaluating talent has been a staple in Montigel's program as the TCU head men's golf coach has taken top-rated juniors and up-and-comers alike and given them the necessary tools to become standout collegiate golfers. Since he took over the program, Montigel has had 10 golfers take home a total of 16 All- American honors with five transferring to TCU in search of a more positive collegiate experience in Chad Magee (1990, 1991), Charlie Stevens (1992), Bret Guetz (2002), David Schultz (2003) and Adam Meyer (2004.)
In addition, Montigel spotted the talent in a Connecticut prep star named J.J. Henry - a player who was under the radar among collegiate golf recruiters - and became the program's lone three-time All-American by the time his career with the Purple and White was finished. The 1998 Golfweek/Taylor Made Co-Collegiate Player of the Year finished second overall at the 1998 NCAA National Championships after finishing a stroke shy of becoming the first-ever men's golfer to capture a national championship in TCU history.
Henry helped the Frogs capture back-to-back Western Athletic Conference championships during the 1997 and 1998 seasons and was selected as the Western Athletic Conference Golfer of the Year in 1998. Currently, Henry is a nine-year standout on the PGA Tour and was a member of the 2006 U.S. Ryder Cup Team.
During his tenure as head men's golf coach at TCU, Montigel has guided 26 golfers to all-conference accolades, which total more than 40 awards for the Frogs. In addition, five of those golfers were selected as Conference Golfer of the Year award winners in Alberto Ochoa (1997), J.J. Henry (1998), Adam Rubinson (2003), Adam Meyer (2004) and J.J. Killeen (2005).
The TCU head men's golf coach has also seen a plethora of awards bestowed upon him as he earned seven Conference Coach of the Year laurels in four separate leagues, including four in four seasons when the Frogs were a member of Conference USA.
The Frogs capped off their stellar run in Conference USA during the 2004-05 campaign when the Purple and White claimed their fourth consecutive Conference USA crown by pummeling the competition en route to securing a 26-stroke victory. In each of their four seasons as a member of Conference USA, the Frogs also possessed the highest national ranking among conference affiliates in the country.
During the 2003-04 season, the Frogs spent the entire season rated among the country's top-10 and finished the campaign ranked 10th, according to the Golfweek/Sagarin ratings system. After a fifth-place finish at the regional championships, the Frogs tied for 20th overall at the NCAA Championships. Following the season, Meyer was selected as the Conference USA Player of the Year and was tabbed as a third-team All-American.
The Frogs matched a school record with three tournament victories during the 2002-03 campaign, including the Conference USA crown en route to finishing the fall season ranked fourth in the country. That season, TCU recorded a then-school record 234 victories - which has since been broken twice - including a school-record 298 triumphs during the 2008-09 campaign.
In 2002, the NCAA selection committee chose TCU as the number-one seed in the NCAA Central Regional Championships, which was the school's first-ever top billing in a regional tournament. The Frogs landed in a tie for 11th at the NCAA Championships that season, and Rubinson matched the best-ever showing by a Frog golfer at nationals with a second-place finish.
The Frogs produced a pair of victories during the 1999-00 campaign, including the program's third Western Athletic Conference crown in five seasons. In the previous season, Montigel's program once again proved to be a national powerhouse as the Purple and White finished 11th overall at the 2000 NCAA Championships.
In the spring of 1998, the Frogs registered their second consecutive Western Athletic Conference crown, which was earned when the Purple and White stormed back from a five-shot deficit on the final day to defeat top-ranked UNLV. The Frogs advanced to the NCAA Championships for a TCU-record fifth-straight season and the seventh time in eight seasons.
In addition, Henry earned the gold medal at the conference tournament en route to being selected as the WAC Golfer of the Year. Henry also became the second golfer in TCU history to earn first team All-American laurels when he finished second overall after falling by a single stroke at the NCAA Championships. That season, Henry sealed the conference title for the Frogs with a hole-in-one on the 17th hole in the final round of action.
During the 1997 campaign, the Frogs captured the Western Athletic Conference title while Montigel earned WAC Coach of the Year laurels for the first time in his career. The Frogs went on to earn a seventh-place showing at the NCAA Championships, which was the program's best national placement under Montigel and the second-best showing in school history. The Frogs were ranked fourth in the final Golfweek polls following the season, and Ochoa became the first-ever TCU golfer to earn first team All-American status.
After taking over the program and beginning to fill the roster with his own players, the Frogs saw a dramatic turnaround in the Southwest Conference as TCU finished in the top-five in seven of their final nine seasons as a conference affiliate, including a second-place finish in the conference on three occasions. Even more impressive is the Frogs finished first or second in the conference only four times in 40 years prior to Montigel taking over the program.
Montigel is the longest-tenured coach at the University and serves a member of the United States Golf Association (USGA) and Golf Coaches Association of America (GCAA). The TCU head men's golf coach has served as the Chairman of the District VI Selection Committee and held a seat on the NCAA Men's Golf Committee as well as the TCU Head Coaches Committee. In 2002, Montigel was voted into the Horned Frogs Classic Hall of Fame and was named TCU Coach of the Year by the Dallas All-Sports Association.
Montigel and his wife, Margaret, have two children, Kelli (22) and Thomas (17). Kelli is a senior at TCU and Thomas is a junior on the golf and basketball teams at Paschal High School.
