Make that three in a row, this time with a new coach.
Springdale Har-Ber continued its domination in girls golf by winning the Class 6A state championship last week at Burns Park in North Little Rock.
Har-Ber shot a combined 510 over the Par 72, 5,400 yards course to outdistance second place Bentonville (515) and third place Fayetteville (517), which finished second by a stroke behind Har-Ber in the 6A-West Conference portion of the tournament. Emmerson Doyle of Cabot shot a 153 to take medalists honors at state while Har-Ber placed two golfers -- Lauren Milligan (155) and Charlie Whorton (159) -- in the top 10.
Har-Ber coach Tim Rippy credits the girls for following up on the consecutive state championships the Lady Wildcats won under Tim Aynes, who retired after coaching the boys and girls golf teams for 12 years at Har-Ber.
"I saw right away these girls had a lot of confidence and a desire to be really good at golf," said Rippy, who was hired at Har-Ber in May. "They already had the work ethic and they came to practice every day ready to work. My job was fun working with them."
Rippy is the son of former Ozark coach Ron Rippy, who won three state championships and finished as state runners-up twice in basketball during 19 years at the school. Tim Rippy soaked up a lot of basketball knowledge from his father and later on from coach Joe Foley when Tim was a student at Arkansas Tech. So, it is with some irony that Tim Rippy's first state championship came in golf and not basketball.
But, oh, he came close. He was the girls basketball coach at Siloam Springs in 2015 when the Lady Panthers fell 39-31 to a standout Greenwood team in the 6A finals at Hot Springs. Rippy also coached at Gentry and it was his time prior to that as a coach at Central Junior High in Springdale that helped him secure the coaching job at Har-Ber. He applied and got the job after Aynes called and told him he was set to retire.
Taking over for a coach who'd just won consecutive state championships, suggests at least some amount of pressure. But Rippy dismissed that notion, saying no one puts more pressure on him than he does himself, then added the Har-Ber girls made the transition as a new coach easy for him.
"They were very accepting right from the get-go," Rippy said. "That says a lot about their character. Lauren Milligan, one of our seniors, was a true leader all year who made the year fun."
Rippy, who played golf in high school for his dad at Ozark, had planned to try and make Arkansas Tech's golf team as a walk-on. But a frank conversation young Mr. Rippy had with Foley, a legendary coach in girls basketball at Arkansas Tech and Arkansas-Little Rock, changed his mind.
"He looked me straight in the eye and asked if I thought I was good enough at golf to play on the (professional) tour," Rippy said. "I said 'no' and he said 'then come work for me.' So, I became a student-assistant in basketball and it was an invaluable experience for me to get to work for coach Foley."
For now, basketball is on the back burner for Rippy, who is already looking forward to next year when the Lady Wildcats will try to win a fourth consecutive championship in girls golf.
"Charlie Whorton is a junior who'll be back and Alexa Burkett, a sophomore who helped us a lot after trying out for golf for the first time, will be back as well," Rippy said. "We'll have tryouts and maybe there'll be another one come along like her."
That's a possibly at Har-Ber, where young golfers want to be a part of what Aynes established and Rippy has continued.