Creekmore Finds Calm In Local Caddie, Former NFL Star Boyfriend Anderson

By Andrew Blair

Hot Springs, Va. – When the week started, Carolyn Creekmore thought she’d go at it alone in a valiant attempt to negotiate the undulating and slick greens of The Homestead’s Cascades Course.

Sure, she’d considered a trusty Homestead caddie who could probably detail the root system of the greens, but initially Creekmore thought she’d trust her instincts and avoid the distraction of another voice.

In recent years, Creekmore had employed a caddie on one memorable occasion. Ironically it came when she won the 2004 USGA Senior Women’s Amateur at Pasatiempo Golf Club in Santa Cruz, Calif. Creekmore allowed friend and 1997 Senior Women’s Amateur champion Nancy Fitzgerald to be on the bag under one condition: excluding their first conversation, Fitzgerald wasn’t allowed to talk.  

Carolyn Creekmore (right) wasted little time in eliminated Brenda Pictor in Wednesday's semifinals, 6 and 5. (Fred Vuich/USGA)

“I’ve never had a caddie,” Creekmore emphasizes. “I took her because I thought I might get nervous, but the first time she talked, I got so nervous that I hit a bad shot. I said, ‘We can’t talk anymore.’ ”

So when Homestead caddie John Mills asked Creekmore earlier this week if she needed a bag, she politely declined.

That game plan all changed on Tuesday. In her morning match against Marianne Towersey, Creekmore had grown so fed-up with her atrocious green-reading and fruitless attempts to hole putts that she did the seemingly unthinkable, turning to Mills on the second nine of the match, asking if he’d help resuscitate her game on the greens.

“I could not read the greens – and then I was getting the heebie-jeebies because then I didn’t think I was reading them right,” said Creekmore. “John was standing on No. 13 tee and I said, ‘Can you read these greens?’ He said, ‘Yeah,’ and I said, ‘Would you come with me the rest of the day?’ ”

Creekmore won three of the next six holes and ultimately ousted Towersey in 19 holes; the route to victory was as much relief as exhilaration.

“I just needed something to calm me down. I was paralyzed,” Creekmore remembers. “This thought kept going through my head: ‘Get John to go with me.’ ‘Get John to go,’ so I did. I would not have won without him.”

And Mills has been with her every step of the way to the championship final. Her putting has so improved that she shot the stroke-play equivalent of one under par (with match-play concessions) in scoring a 3-and-2 quarterfinal round victory over Patricia Cornett Wednesday morning.

Creekmore, 57, dominated her semifinal round encounter, building a 5-up lead through eight holes before wiping out Brenda Pictor of Marietta, Ga., 6-and-5, to advance to Thursday’s deciding match against Sherry Herman of Farmingdale, N.J. Herman, 51, scored a 19-hole victory over Robyn Puckett of Irvine, Calif., in the semifinals.  

Good Vibes, Past and Present

Last year at Tulsa (Okla.) Country Club, Creekmore lost in the semifinal round to eventual finalist Toni Wiesner. Now, Creekmore is playing in her memory; she and a couple of other Dallas-area players this week have blue ribbons on their hats in honor of her late longtime friend, who died in late July of cancer.

	Texan Carolyn Creekmore is one win away from a second Senior Women's Amateur title. (Fred Vuich/USGA)

“Toni was the greatest and I can’t believe she’s gone,” Creekmore says of the three-time Senior Women’s Amateur runner-up. “This is a championship that she wanted to win, but don’t think that I don’t want to win it, too. I do. I definitely do. It would be icing. It would be icing on the cake.”

Creekmore also gains inspiration from her longtime boyfriend Donnie Anderson, the former National Football League standout, who spent most of his career playing running back for the Green Bay Packers and won two Super Bowls while under the command of legendary coach Vince Lombardi.

Creekmore’s first date with Anderson was a memorable one. Playing golf together at Royal Oaks Country Club in Dallas, Creekmore made quite an impression on Anderson, whom she partnered with in a “friendly” match, posting two early birdies.

She unabashedly turned to Anderson after making birdie at the eighth hole.

“Hey, dude,” she jabbed. “Are you going to play or watch?”

Since, Creekmore’s nickname has been ‘dudie.’

Anderson has been following her matches on the USGA Web site this week and the further Creekmore advances, the more nervous he gets; sometimes it’s probably like standing on the sidelines when the game is on the line.

After her second-round victory, his text to Creekmore read, “Dudie, you’re killing me.”

“It’s horrible having to watch it on the computer. Just horrible,” Creekmore laughs partly because she knows at least someone can. In addition to combining for a mean chicken spaghetti recipe, they raise horses on a 60-acre farm outside of Dallas.

Of course, Anderson provides some Lombardi-inspired words along the way. Most of his advice points toward limiting mistakes, instrumental to championship football as well as winning a USGA title.

“Last night he told me to go home and put my feet up,” she remembers. “Being tired [Wednesday] would be a mistake.”

Buoyed by strong ball-striking and a quiet putting stroke, the third-seeded Creekmore is still going strong. Her mindset going forward would make most fierce putting surfaces blush.

“Don’t be afraid,” she keeps repeating to herself. “Just hit good shots and something good will happen.”

So far, things couldn’t be better.

Andrew Blair is communications director for the Virginia State Golf Association. E-mail him with questions or comments at ablair@vsga.org.