Hall of Fame
Lisa Tinkler was hired to launch the Drury women’s golf program in 2003 and made it a winner from the very start.
With a squad of almost entirely freshmen, the Panthers finished as the Heartland Conference runner-up and ended the year 40th in the Golfstat rankings in their inaugural season. The next year, Drury won the Heartland title, tied for the West Regional championship, and finished ranked eighth in NCAA-II women’s golf.
Their 2005 league title started a run of three straight conference championships, and their title streak included their move from the Heartland to the Great Lakes Valley Conference in 2007. The Panthers finished fourth at the 2007 NCAA-II National Championship in Pensacola, Florida, in just the fourth year of the program’s existence.
While the Panthers maintained their status as a conference and regional contender, Tinkler recruited and coached one of the most dominant student-athletes ever to wear the Drury scarlet & gray in any sport, Tonya Choate. Choate won a conference championship in each of her three seasons at Drury, was a three-time NCAA-II All-American, won 12 tournaments, including the NCAA-II East Regional in 2006, and advanced to three NCAA-II National Tournaments.
Tinkler was named conference Coach of the Year three times, earning the award once in the Heartland and twice in the GLVC, and she was named the East Region Coach of the Year in 2007. From 2004 to 2012, Tinkler guided seven Drury teams to NCAA-II regional tournaments, with two of them advancing to the national championship tournaments. In addition, six of her golfers advanced as individuals to the NCAA-II national championship site.
Tinker stepped away from Drury to revive a women’s golf program at Loyola (La.) that had been dormant for 40 years and instantly made that team competitive. She guided Loyola to an NCAA Tournament appearance in just its second year.
In 2017, Tinkler returned to Drury to take over as head coach again and led the program through the 2019-20 season. The Panthers won their first tournament in three years in Tinkler’s first season back, and she set the foundation for the current program, which has finished in the top four of the GLVC in each of the last three seasons.
Originally from Leawood, Kansas, Tinkler came to Drury after a successful playing career at Evangel. At the age of 39, Tinkler qualified for the NAIA National Tournament as an individual and finished 14th nationally to earn All-American honors. She is four-time Springfield city champion and could often be found near the top of the Missouri State Amateur leaderboard.
Tinkler stepped down from her head coaching responsibilities at Drury to concentrate on her business, Redline Athletics. She owns two Redline franchises but has also developed additional locations in western Missouri, eastern Kansas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. Tinkler has been involved in WIN, the Women’s Intersport Network in southwest Missouri, and is a board member of the Springfield Area Sports Hall of Fame. She still resides in southwest Missouri with her husband Casey, and the couple have three children - Adriane, Travis, and Olivia.
