Sun, sand and Dayton golf

After a hospitalization for congestive heart failure, Bob Cherichella ’73 came home on a Friday in February. On Monday, he and his wife, Heather, hosted a dinner at their Hilton Head, South Carolina, home for the University of Dayton men’s golf team, their parents and a handful of UD staff.

The Cherichellas love golf. They love UD. And they show it. They host either the men’s or women’s team, sometimes both, every year.

Heather did not attend UD, but “none of this would have happened without her,” Bob said. In 2008, at Bob’s UD reunion, they asked then-women’s golf coach Sally Kosters why the team didn’t come to Hilton Head. Under the NCAA rules then, they couldn’t unless there was a tournament.

“I’ll find one,” Heather said.

And she did. The Flyers played in 2009 on Wilmington Island — an hour-and-a-half from the Cherichellas’ house — in 40-degree temperatures. The Cherichellas provided hot chocolate and breakfast. This year was 25 degrees warmer, and little Carolina wrens chirped near the Cherichellas’ home on the Wexford Country Club course, the site of the Wexford Intercollegiate Golf Tournament. And the team got a big pasta dinner.

The players, Heather said, realize what they have at Dayton, “not only the UD experience but a world-class practice facility at NCR Country Club.”

In a short after-dinner speech to players and parents, Bob stressed not his health but the UD family, including Gip Hoagland ’93, who is retiring from coaching.

“We’ll miss him terribly,” Bob said.

There were speeches (and food) the night before, too. Dave Callahan ’76 and his wife, Debbie, hosted a gathering of scores of alumni and friends at Long Cove Country Club, next door to Wexford. Seating arrangements scattered the players among the guests, encouraging talk of golf and other things; one grad was glad the player at his table knew of Dayton hangouts Tim’s and Kramers — and was graduating at the end of his junior year to move on to an MBA.

UD staff speaking included former Flyer basketball player Josh Posterino ’99, who now raises funds for UD athletics, and Provost Darlene Weaver, who spoke about UD’s initiatives, including the development of onMain, which is now seeing construction of Think Dayton, a home for innovative collaboration among UD, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, and several industries.

Also speaking was senior finance major Victor Caliguri, who over the next two days led the Flyer golfers at the Wexford Intercollegiate with a three-round total of 216, his fifth top-10 finish of the season.

Photographs courtesy Breckin Taylor / Dayton Athletics