July 10, 2009

By Doug Kroll
NCAA.com

With the 2008-09 season fading into memory and fall practices still a month away, NCAA.com is spending two weeks in July looking back on 10 athletic programs that stood not just once, but twice (and, in three cases, thrice) atop the college sports world with national championships in '08-`09. From Messiah's magic soccer runs to Washington's scintillating softball title, this 10-part series showcases the schools that helped to define another unforgettable year of college sports.

Look Back Series: Messiah (July 9)

Texas A&M Photo Gallery

Maybe good things really do come in threes.

Three has been a number in the back of a Texas A&M fan’s head for years. Ever since being crowned national champions in softball in 1987, the school was stuck on three national championships.

And three will continue to be a number Aggies fans remember for a long time, after Texas A&M doubled that previous total during the 2008-09 school year, winning the school’s first men’s golf, and men’s and women’s outdoor track & field national championships to become the only program in Division I to rack up three titles in ’08-’09.

Not that the men’s golf team has been out of the national spotlight all of these years. They qualified for the national tournament 24 times, but had never finished higher than fourth, all the way back in 1982.

But the team’s No. 1 player, senior Bronson Burgoon, made sure the Aggies would head back to College Station with a trophy with what Golfweek Magazine described as “one of the best shots in college golf history.”

With the match all-square heading to the 18th hole, Burgoon hit a 125-yard gap wedge from the rough to within three inches of the pin, to cripple Arkansas’ national championship hopes.

Aggies head coach J.T. Higgins wouldn’t want anyone else with a chance to win the title.

“Bronson dominated his matches and played great golf all week,” A&M Head Coach J.T. Higgins said after the match. “He told me earlier this week that he wanted to be on 18 with a chance to win the national championships coming up the last fairway. What a way to come through. That’s all I said to him on 18. I wouldn’t rather have anybody else playing this hole than you right now even after losing four straight. I knew he was a clutch performer. I knew he’d come through and he did. I’m so proud of him.”

All not bad for a team that finished third at the Big 12 Championship a month earlier.

And merely two weeks later, something that hadn’t been done by any school since 1990 would propel Texas A&M back into the national spotlight again.

Aggies Track & Field head coach Pat Henry had swept titles before in outdoor track. Back in 1989 and 1990 he did just that when he was in charge at LSU. Nineteen years later, Henry can say he did it again.

It was a pair of runner-up performances that handed both the Men’s and Women’s Outdoor Track & Field titles to A&M for the first time in school history for either. 

On the men’s side, the Aggies’ run to the crown took until the final race, but senior Justin Oliver delivered on his anchor run, propelling the men to a national title.

While on the women’s side, the big points came from the triple jump, where Yasmine Regis was in sixth place entering the final three rounds.

"I knew I was the last event to go on," said Regis after winning the national title. "I was trying to rack up the most points I could for my teammates. It started off pretty rocky, but I dug deep and I pulled out what I needed to do.”

The Aggies took home more national championships than any school in Division I, and tied for the most with Wartburg and Messiah (both Division III) for any school in the NCAA.

It’s something that will be remembered for a long time to come in College Station.