Former LPGA player Mary Bryan, a pioneer in TV broadcast and a college coach, dies at 78

Former LPGA pro Mary Bryan, who enjoyed a pioneering career in television after her time on tour as well as several stints as a college golf coach, died peacefully on New Year’s Eve after a year-long battle with pancreatic cancer. She was 78.

Bryan competed on the LPGA from 1971-1984 and then transitioned to a decades-long career in broadcasting. Thirty years ago, she joined Judy Rankin as the only female commentators to work men’s major tournaments. Bryan worked over 300 national broadcasts for the likes of ESPN, CBS, NBC, ABC, Golf Channel and the PGA Tour Radio Network.

Bryan witnessed some incredible feats from the broadcast booth – Annika Sorenstam’s 59 and Juli Inkster qualifying for the LPGA Hall of Fame, to name a couple – but she ultimately found there’s nothing quite like watching college players whom she had mentored achieve success.

She took up college coaching in her 60s and spent three years as an assistant coach at UCF alongside head coach Courtney Trimble before the pair moved on to Louisville. Bryan called her time working alongside Trimble the best thing she’d done in golf. It was her time to give back to a game that had given her so much.

“When you’re building programs, you’re not going to get the best recruits,” Trimble once told Golfweek. “You have to help players get better.

“That’s what Mary does.”

This article originally appeared on Golfweek: LPGA player Mary Bryan, longtime broadcaster and coach, dies at 78