{"id":316641,"date":"2026-05-31T16:40:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-31T16:40:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/316641\/"},"modified":"2026-05-31T16:40:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-31T16:40:14","slug":"alabama-hires-houstons-lydia-lasprilla-as-next-womens-golf-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/316641\/","title":{"rendered":"Alabama hires Houston&#8217;s Lydia Lasprilla as next women&#8217;s golf coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>May 30, 2026, 12:25 p.m. ET<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">The biggest job vacancy in the current women&#8217;s college golf head coaching cycle has been filled.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Alabama announced Saturday it hired Lydia Lasprilla to lead the Crimson Tide women&#8217;s golf program. Lasprilla spent the past eight seasons at Houston, five of those as head coach. Now, she&#8217;s heading to Tuscaloosa looking to help Alabama make its return to the NCAA Championship for the first time since 2022.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">&#8220;I am so honored to join the University of Alabama as the head women&#8217;s golf coach,'&#8221;Lasprilla said in a release. &#8220;The tradition, the brand, and the university is very special. To see the investment that Alabama has made, especially in the golf facility at Crimson Reserve, is unmatched. I am looking forward to building a winning culture and winning championships for years to come. I can&#8217;t wait to get started and am so thankful for this opportunity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Lasprilla guided the Cougars to historical success, leading the program to four consecutive NCAA Regional appearances from 2023 through 2026 and its first-ever berth in the NCAA Championships in 2026. Under Lasprilla&#8217;s leadership, the Cougars reached new heights since she assumed her head coach role in 2021-22. At the beginning of her tenure, Houston was ranked No. 69 nationally and this season, the Cougars climbed to No. 27 in the NCAA Women&#8217;s Scoreboard rankings. In addition to climbing up the national rankings, Houston finished 20th overall at the <a href=\"http:\/\/golfweek.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/golf\/college\/2026\/05\/28\/stanford-2026-ncaa-womens-golf-championship-highlights\/90290541007\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":b|e|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\">2026 NCAA Championships<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Lasprilla became the second head coach in Houston history with her hiring in June 2021.<\/p>\n<p>Need a news break? <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":body nav (play)|e|auto spike click:6|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_sp_a\" href=\"https:\/\/play.usatoday.com\/?itm_source=SPIKE&amp;itm_campaign=PLAYSPIKE&amp;itm_medium=ONSITE\">Check out the all new PLAY hub with puzzles, games and more!<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">&#8220;We are excited to welcome Lydia Lasprilla as the next head coach of Alabama golf,&#8221; Alabama athletic director Gre Byrne said. &#8220;Lydia is a rising star in the sport and did an exceptional job during her time at Houston. Lydia&#8217;s vision aligned with Alabama&#8217;s commitment to comprehensive excellence.\u00a0We look forward to her leading Alabama golf to championship levels.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Houston Vice President for Athletics Eddie Nunez said a national search would commence to replace Lasprilla.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Golfweek&#8217;s Lance Ringler contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"May 30, 2026, 12:25 p.m. ET The biggest job vacancy in the current women&#8217;s college golf head coaching&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[33,56,58,57,113707,11074,8778,10317,45,218,11076,11075,2518,8779,184,39,43,16269,46,20940,216,36],"class_list":["post-316641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-accessfree","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news","tag-sourcegolfweek","tag-sstssportsgolfcollege","tag-sstsncollege","tag-tagalabama","tag-tagcollege-sports","tag-tagcolleges-universities","tag-taggolf","tag-taggolfweek-college-golf","tag-taghouston","tag-tagncaa","tag-tagoverall-positive","tag-tagsec-conference-football","tag-tagsec-hub","tag-tagsports-coaching-training","tag-tagsports-news","tag-tagwomens-sports","tag-tx","tag-typestory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}