Jim McLean’s The Houston Dynasty: Tales from College Golf’s Greatest Team takes readers back to one of the most remarkable eras in college golf — the rise of the University of Houston from a struggling program to a national powerhouse.
McLean, who played for Houston from 1968 to 1973 and earned All-American honors, provides an insider’s perspective on the players, personalities, rivalries and culture that defined the program. The book also features a foreword by broadcaster Jim Nantz, who humorously recalls having “masqueraded as a varsity golfer” while living in Taub Hall with future stars Fred Couples and Blaine McCallister.
At the center of the story is legendary coach Dave Williams. When Williams took over in 1951, Houston’s golf team was
coming off a 25-match losing streak. Yet at that year’s spring sports banquet, Williams boldly predicted that his team would win national championships. The declaration was met with laughter, and Williams was soon nicknamed “National Championship Williams.”
The laughter did not last long.
In addition to winning 16 team national championships and eight individual ones, Williams' teams won 14 conference championships and 342 tournaments overall. The Houston Dynasty is a celebration of one of college golf’s great teams and the coach whose vision turned a struggling program into a championship machine.
Williams proved to be an extraordinary recruiter, teacher and builder of talent. Under his leadership, Houston developed into a dominant program in collegiate golf and established a legacy that remains extraordinary in the history of the sport.
McLean’s firsthand perspective gives the story authenticity, while the memories of players and figures such as Nantz add personality and nostalgia. It is a fitting record of an extraordinary chapter in Houston golf history. Ironically, while the Cougars won titles in 1968 and ’69 when McLean was a member of the team, it played second fiddle in its own state during much of his time on the team, losing to the University of Texas in 1972, which was led by Ben Crenshaw and Tom Kite. The majority of the stories center around McLean’s tenure as a Cougar and personal memories, along with additional reporting of other Cougar greats and stories passed down over the years.
McLean captures Williams’ philosophy particularly well when he writes that the coach “turned the Cougar golf team from a scrappy operation into a national powerhouse.” That transformation is the heart of the book. It is not simply a story about trophies; it is a story about creating a culture in which players expected to compete — and expected to win.
The scale of Houston’s success is almost difficult to comprehend. By the time McLean graduated, Houston had won 12 of the previous 16 NCAA Championships and finished second in the other four. The university even built a trophy room devoted exclusively to the team’s growing collection of hardware.
Yet the most compelling aspect of The Houston Dynasty is the human story behind those championships. McLean recalls that “Coach had a way of making us feel like we were invincible,” describing Williams as having “an uncanny knack for turning grit and determination into championships.”
That combination — talent, confidence, discipline and relentless determination — is what makes the Houston story so compelling. The book offers golf fans a look at an extraordinary collection of players, but it also explores what happens when a visionary coach creates an environment where excellence becomes an expectation.
For fans of college golf, Texas sports history and stories about championship teams, The Houston Dynasty provides an entertaining and revealing look at a program that helped redefine what was possible in collegiate golf. More than a chronicle of victories, it is a tribute to a coach and the players who transformed his improbable prediction into a dynasty.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Book review: How one coach built a college golf dynasty
