No. 2 Oregon a Pac-12 women's golf title contender this week at Eugene Country Club

Derek Radley had been on the job and in Eugene for just two days when he boarded a plane headed for Taiwan, making good on a promise he made to Oregon athletic director Rob Mullens during the hiring process.

“My wife wasn’t real thrilled,” said Radley, the Ducks’ women’s golf coach since 2018. “Our furniture wan’t even in the house yet. … (Rob) asked me what’s it gonna take to succeed here and I said just rolling up my sleeves and getting after it.”

For Radley, that meant recruiting the best players he could find, no matter where they were located.

What he found on the other side of the Pacific Ocean that summer four years ago were a pair players who have become significant pieces on a team that is now ranked No. 2 nationally — the highest ranking in program history — heading into the Pac-12 Championships Monday through Wednesday at the Eugene Country Club.

The Oregon program has never won a conference title and it's only finished in the top-3 two times, when the Ducks were second in 2015 and third in 2010.

There are four other teams from the Pac-12 ranked in the top 25, including No. 1 Stanford, but that shouldn’t faze Oregon, which has won three tournaments this season.

This spring alone, the Ducks brought home team titles from the Florida State Match Up and Northrop Gruman Challenge, and then had consecutive runner-up finishes at the PING/ASU Invitational and Silverado Showdown heading into the conference tournament.

“I know that they are excited about the opportunity,” Radley said. “They’re battle-tested from this year and really proven that we can beat some great teams and win and so I’m really excited for postseason moving forward.”

'Team Taiwan' leads the way

Radley’s first recruiting trip as the Oregon coach eventually paid off when he landed Hsin-Yu (Cynthia) Lu and Ching-Tzu Chen, who joined forces with Tze-Han (Heather) Lin to give the Ducks a formidable trio of countrywomen.

“Team Taiwan,” Radley said. “Those three have just really elevated this program. Their work ethic at a young age has really given them the skill set they need to compete at a high level.”

Lu, a sophomore, leads the team with a 72.48 scoring average. She was the highest-ranked recruit in program history when she signed with Oregon in 2020 while No. 48 in the World Amateur Golf rankings.

She became the Ducks’ first outright tournament champion since 2015 when she won the Mason Rudolph Championship in September.

Lin, the Ducks’ lone senior who was already signed when Radley was hired, is second on the team with a 72.55 average.

“She’s really stepped into that leadership role and bought into what we know and how to be successful and really pushed the others to be great,” Radley said. “We couldn’t have done it without her … she’s going to leave (the program) in an incredible spot moving forward.”

Chen, a junior, is fourth in the team with a scoring average of 73.07. She led the Ducks’ with a 20th-place finish at the NCAA championships last spring.

“When I first came here it was just me,” Lin said. “It was very different that what it is now. It’s been really fun. I’ve gotten really close to them and because of our culture, we always have each other’s back. I know they support me and I support them. That’s been really cool.”

Home course advantage

Before taking the Oregon job, Radley was an assistant at Arizona when the Wildcats won the national title in 2018.

He soon hired Monica Vaughn to be his assistant, bringing the 2017 NCAA individual champion closer to home. Vaughn was a two-time OSAA state champion for Reedsport High before leaving for a college career at Arizona State.

Those two have been the architects behind the Ducks’ rise to national prominence.

The Ducks returned from the 2020 COVID-19 season to finish 11th at the NCAA championships last season in in what was their first national tournament appearance since 2017 and just their sixth since 2000.

“Rankings aren’t everything,” Radley said. “However, I’ve been preaching to our team we’re the best team in the country if we have all cylinders firing at the same time.”

There is very little scoring disparity among Oregon’s top five players, with less than a stroke between Lu’s team-best 72.48 average and No. 5 Briana Chacon’s 73.25 average. Sofie Kibsgaard Nielsen, a junior from Denmark, who has four top-8 finishes this spring, owns a 72.85 average.

“It’s pretty special,” Radley said. “Consistency’s a big word for us and I feel like any given week any one of our five could be the No. 1 man. And so, to have faith in themselves and each other is big for confidence moving forward.”

Playing at home this week should help. The weather forecast looks wet and the temperatures cool, which could work in Oregon's advantage.

“Since my freshman year we’ve been talking about how my senior year we’re going to host the Pac-12 championships," Lin said. "It’s also going to be my first and last ever home tournament so I’m very, very excited. ... Eugene’s such a unique place with the weather and the tall trees and the fast greens. I’m sure not a lot of schools have experienced these kind of conditions.”

Besides the top-ranked Cardinal, the other top Pac-12 teams are No. 7 Arizona State, No. 12 Southern California and No. 16 UCLA.

“So excited,” Radley said. “In golf, we don’t normally get a home-course advantage. … To be able to have all the great Pac-12 teams here in Eugene is really special.”

Follow Chris Hansen on Twitter @chansen_RG or email at chansen@registerguard.com.

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: A team on the rise: No. 2 Oregon a Pac-12 women's golf title contender