Q&A: Oakland University Basketball Coach Greg Kampe
With Tom Lang
Greg Kampe is the long-time, school record-setting basketball coach at Oakland University – a coach who loves the game of golf as well – and has great connections to the game we all love.
Oakland’s upset victory over Kentucky in last year’s NCAA tournament was Kampe’s 699th overall as head coach. Kampe is now in his 41st year at Oakland, 11 seasons more than Tom Izzo at Michigan State.
His home course is Oakland Hills, and his best-ever handicap was a 6, but it’s gone up since then.
Question: Do you recall when it happened and how you fell in love with golf ?
Answer: “My father taught me the game at 8 years old. I did all the kids golf stuff, but he told me it’s for your old age. I was into football, basketball and I ran track. Dad said to play those sports, but when you’re older, golf will get you through mid-life sports. So, I didn’t practice much, but my senior year in college (at Bowling Green) I took two golf classes, and you had to play 10 rounds of golf to get a pass or a fail. So, I played a lot in the fall quarter and the spring. Going out almost every day and having fun with it is when I fell in love with the game.”
Q: Do you see similarities between the sports of golf and basketball ?
A: “The sport of golf you have to stay in the moment and concentrate on the next shot. And in basketball, we talk next-play mentality all the time, and I think I got that from golf. The reality of it is, if you hit a bad shot, that one can’t become two, and two can’t become three. Don’t turn that bogey into a double or a triple. You’ve got to grind and think about the next shot. And in basketball, we teach that. If you turn the ball over, okay, but it can’t become a second one. You have to be able to let go of it and have the next-play mentality. That’s something we really preach. I got that from golf.”
Q: Do you have any golf superstitions?
A: “That’s interesting. I’m asked that all the time about basketball but never about golf. I will say that the only superstition I have, and it might sound goofy, when I’m playing in a tournament or an invitational – but not when I’m just out playing – on my golf ball on one side I put a smiley face and on one side a frown face. And if I’m playing good, any time I putt I have the frown face up (showing), to try to keep me to stay in the moment, a reminder the next shot counts. But if I’m playing poorly, I put the smiley face up to tell myself you can get better. It’s reverse psychology.”
Q: What attributes of golf draws you into the game?
A: “The competition against yourself. There’s no greater competition than self-competition. And the big thing I try to teach my team is, you’re going to get knocked down. And you have to learn how to get up, and to get up quick. When you’re on the golf course, you can hit three of the greatest shots in a row. Then you shank the next one, and what are you going to do? And the great thing about the game of golf, no matter what your handicap is and no matter the score you shoot, the next time you play you can try to beat that.”
Q: What’s your favorite club in the bag and why?
A: “Putter, because I’m a terrible chipper and at a course like Oakland Hills I can putt from 30-40 yards off the green. But as far as others, it would be my 7-wood, because for some reason I’m always 175-180 yards away. No matter what course I always seem to be that yardage out, and that’s my 7-wood.”
Q: Do you have a golf bucket list?
A: “I’m to the point that I only have two left: Augusta National, and the other is Fisher’s Island. It’s out in the Cape Cod area, it’s really good. Top 20 in the world, so I’ve been told it is. I was ready to go (this summer) but something came up and I couldn’t make it. So, I would have had it down to one.”
Kampe then listed his favorite bucket list courses: “For me, my number one is Cypress Point. The next top three or four would be Frier’s Head, Monterey Peninsula Country Club, Shinnecock and Oakmont.”
Q. You’ve had the good fortune to travel across the country. What do you like about Michigan golf courses compared to other areas of the country?
A: “I think Michigan courses have their own unique feeling, as you walk the course. When you walk the Michigan courses, you’re really in nature. You’re up in God’s country…like God reached down with his hand and said I’m making this beautiful land and the trees. A lot of courses have taken trees out, but most of the northern Michigan courses still have all the tree lines and the change of color is still what makes it so majestic. And it makes it its own brand.”
Q: What coaching tactics or motivation would you try if you could be Keegan Bradley’s vice captain of the next Ryder Cup?
A: “I think what happened in the last Ryder Cup, you have to use that as motivation. You’re playing for your country. For me, our archrival is Detroit. We have the countdown. And at almost every practice our minds are ‘we don’t lose to Detroit.’ There’s two things we don’t do in this program – we don’t lose on senior night and we don’t lose to Detroit. We have that mantra everyday with our players. So, I would try to use something like that on those (PGA Tour) guys. I don’t know if it would be successful, but that would be my mentality.”
