Staff Directory
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The 2025-26 season is Aimee Neff’s fifth as head coach of the UNC women’s golf program.
Neff rejoined the Tar Heels in 2021 after three seasons (2018-21) as head coach at Florida Atlantic University. She was the associate head coach at Carolina in 2017-18.
Carolina has won six tournaments in Neff’s first four seasons and individual Tar Heels have won four times. UNC had won six times in the previous 12 years and had four medalists in the previous 11 seasons.
“It is an exciting time to be part of our program,” says Neff. “With the renovation of Finley, which included a world-class training facility, and a new team building in the works, our players have all the tools necessary to be champions. Our focus remains on winning championships, while upholding academic excellence. The unwavering support for Carolina athletics fuels us, while our dedicated staff ensures the players are primed for success here and beyond.”
In 2024-25, the Tar Heels added a pair of team trophies and an individual title as Carolina finished ranked 13th in the nation and played in an NCAA regional for a fourth-straight season.
UNC shot a school-record 830 in winning the Cavalier Regional Preview at the University of Virginia’s course and set another UNC record at 31 under par in winning the Yale Invitational West at Greg Norman’s PGA West Course. The Tar Heels had seven top-five finishes in 10 events and carded four of the 10-best rounds and three of the lowest four 54-hole totals in Carolina history.
Megan Streicher earned All-ACC honors for the second year in a row, Inez Ng shot a UNC-record 12 under par in winning in Charlottesville, five Tar Heels made the Academic All-ACC team and four were All-America Scholars. Streicher, Ing Iadpluem and Helen Yeung finished the season with the second-, fourth- and eighth-lowest stroke averages in UNC history. Yeung set the freshman scoring record, toppling the mark Streicher set in Neff’s second season as head coach.
In 2023-24, the Tar Heels, won three tournaments, advanced to match play in the ACC Championship and qualified out of the Auburn Regional to compete in the NCAA Championship.
Carolina won the St Andrews Links Collegiate at the Jubilee and The Old Course, defeating Vanderbilt, 4-2, in medal match play to win the team title. The Tar Heels also won the UCF Challenge and swept three matches to claim the NC State Match Play Invitational. UNC finished third at Auburn, qualifying for the NCAA Championship for the first time since 2017.
It was the first time Carolina won three tournaments in a season since 2012-13.
Kayla Smith was medalist at St Andrews, made the cut to play all four rounds in the NCAA Championship and concluded her career with three of the five-lowest single-season scoring averages and the second-best career average in UNC history. Streicher earned All-ACC honors, broke the single-season scoring record and moved into No. 1 in career scoring by a Tar Heel.
Other highlights from Neff’s four seasons as head coach include:
• five players have combined to compile the eight-lowest single-season scoring averages in UNC history (and 10 of the 12 best);
• Streicher, Smith, Krista Junkkari, Iadpluem and Reagan Southerland have five of the nine-lowest career stroke averages in UNC history;
• Streicher (64), Junkkari (65) and Smith (65) have set UNC’s 18-hole scoring records;
• the eight-lowest individual rounds in UNC history have been produced in the last four seasons by seven different Tar Heels;
• have recorded nine of the 10-lowest team rounds in UNC history;
• in 2024-25, UNC set its 18-hole stroke record (13-under 271 in the Cavalier Regional Preview); the 18-hole score-to-par record (14 under at PGA West); the 54-hole stroke record (830 at Virginia); and the 54-hole score-to-par record (31-under-par in winning the Yale Invitational West).
• Streicher (2024 and 2025) and Smith (2022 and 2023) earned All-ACC honors becoming the first Tar Heel to earn multiple all-conference awards since 2013;
• it is the first time Tar Heels have earned All-ACC honors in four straight seasons since 2002-14;
• Junkkari tied the 54-hole UNC record with a 12-under 204 in the 2021 Cougar Classic, and Ng broke that mark with a 12-under 201 last season in the Cavalier Regional Preview;
• Smith and Junkkari won individual titles in 2022-23, the first time two Tar Heels were medalists in the same season since Meaghan Francella and Ashley Prange in 2003-04;
• Iadpluem shot back-to-back 68s as a freshman at St Andrews, including one round at The Old Course, which was the low round of the day in the St Andrews Links Collegiate;
• Streicher and Inez Ng represented their home countries of South Africa and Singapore in the 2024 World Amateur Team Championship;
• Yeung shot 67 in the 2025 ACC Championship, the lowest score ever by a Tar Heel freshman in the tournament;
• Crista Izuzquiza shot 66 in round three in the 2023 ACC Championship, which tied the lowest round ever by a Tar Heel in an ACC Championship;
• Carolina shot 1-over 865 at the Palouse Ridge Golf Club in Pullman, Wash., in the 2023 NCAA regional. That was the second-best 54-hole total and score to par by UNC in a regional;
• Streicher shot 7-under 209 in Pullman, which tied the best score and score to par by a Tar Heel in a regional;
• Ng shot 67 in the third round of the 2023 regional, which tied the second-best round in a regional by a Tar Heel. Ng’s 211 total was the fourth best by a Tar Heel in a regional;
Neff, a member of the Women’s Golf Coaches Association Board of Directors from 2019-24, became the sixth head coach in Carolina women’s golf history, joining Jean Eller (1973-74), Dr. Pam Robinson (1974-75), Dot Gunnells (1974-93), Sally Austin (1993-2009) and Jan Mann (2009-21).
The Carmel, Ind., native is pursuing a master’s as a part of UNC’s Masters of Applied Professional Studies with a focus in psychology and physiology.
At FAU, Neff helped the Owls improve their Golfweek ranking from No. 189 when she was named head coach prior to the 2018-19 season to No. 94 in the nation in 2020-21. In her three seasons in Boca Raton, FAU won two team tournaments and four individual events and improved its scoring average by more than 12 strokes per round.
Prior to becoming the head coach at FAU, Neff served as the associate head coach at Carolina in 2017-18. The Tar Heels won the Briar’s Creek Invitational with the second-lowest 54-hole score in Carolina history and played in the NCAA TPC Harding Park Regional in San Francisco. Kelly Whaley set the school single-season stroke average record and became the first Tar Heel to ever shoot three rounds in the 60s in a tournament, when she set the 54-hole UNC record at 12-under 204. Freshman Ava Bergner also set the Tar Heels’ 18-hole scoring record with a 6-under 66.
Neff was an assistant for three seasons at her alma mater, Michigan State, from 2013-16 and for one season at Vanderbilt in 2016-17.The Spartans were Big Ten Champions in 2014, played in two NCAA regionals and advanced to the 2014 NCAA Championship.
Neff’s student-athletes have succeeded academically at each of her four coaching stops, earning 35 All-America Scholar Awards.
She attended Michigan State from 2007-11 and became the third MSU women’s golfer to earn All-Big Ten honors four times. She had 13 top-10 finishes, led the Spartans to the Big Ten championship as a senior and won the Big Ten Conference Medal of Honor in 2011. She was an All-America Scholar and member of the Academic All-Big Ten team three times.
Neff won the Illinois Women’s Open in 2008 and 2009 and the Indiana Women’s Open in 2009 and 2010. She played in the 2012 U.S. Open in Kohler, Wis., and on the Symetra Tour from 2011-14, competing in the United States, Australia and New Zealand.
She holds Titleist Performance Institute Certification in Levels I and II and is certified in AimPoint Express and Trackman University.
