WT Alum Makes Major Gift to Support Women’s Golf, Volleyball Teams

Copy by Chip Chandler, 806-651-2124, cchandler@wtamu.edu

CANYON, Texas — Self-described super-fans of West Texas A&M University women’s athletics have established two new endowments that will provide both support and scholarship dollars for two teams.

Rick and Carole Couch have made a gift of $50,000 and a planned gift of $175,000 to establish the Rick and Carole Couch Lady Buff Golf Program Fund, which will enhance player development and help finance trips to tournaments.

An additional $175,000 planned gift will create the Couch Volleyball Scholarship Endowment, which provide a minimum $1,000 annual scholarship.

Though the gift will support two of WT’s acclaimed women’s sports, the golf team in particular is closest to the Couchs’ heart.

“I enjoy golfing myself, and it’s even more fun to watch those young women who can really iht the golf ball,” Rick Couch said. “They hit it a lot better than I do.”

Couch, a 1968 WT graduate, met Meredith Jameson, who earned WT degrees in 2005 and 2009, shortly after she began coaching the team, when he came to Canyon from the Dallas area to play in a Buffalo Club golf tournament.

“For years and years, Rick has been our biggest fan for WT women’s golf,” Jameson said. “He means so much to us. And this gift means so much because he’s an alum and I’m an alum. We both bleed maroon. This gift really shows what WT means to both him and Carole.”

Rick Couch said he and his wife consider Jameson an adopted daughter, and her players are the couple’s adopted grandchildren.

“I told her that, other than their parents, I’d be their biggest supporter and come watch them play whenever I could,” Couch said. “She said that other than their parents, no one comes to watch them anyway.”

“That’s true,” Jameson laughed. “We are a sport that doesn’t compete on campus, so we don’t have as many fans. Rick and Carole traveled to Houston to see us compete in a national championship and traveled to Durango, Colorado, where they saw freshman Holly Winter win the regional championship. He has witnessed so many memorable moments of Lady Buff Golf.”

Couch—who went through WT’s ROTC program and joined the U.S. Army after graduating, then served as a helicopter pilot in Vietnam—said the gift is just as meaningful to him as it is to the team.

“I enjoyed my time at WT, and we wanted to pay that back somehow,” Couch said.

The women’s golf team recently advanced to the NCAA Division II Elite 8 for a third consecutive year and won the NCAA West Regional Championship in May.

Recruiting, retaining and rewarding top student-athletes is in line with the University’s long-range plan, WT 125: From the Panhandle to the World.

That plan is fueled by the historic One West comprehensive fundraising campaign, which reached its initial $125 million goal 18 months after publicly launching in September 2021. The campaign’s new goal is to reach $175 million by 2025; currently, it has raised nearly $160 million.

About West Texas A&M University

WT is located in Canyon, Texas, on a 342-acre residential campus. Established in 1910, the University has been part of The Texas A&M University System since 1990. WT, a Hispanic Serving Institution since 2016, boasts an enrollment of about 10,000 and offers 59 undergraduate degree programs and more than 40 graduate degrees, including two doctoral degrees. The University is also home to the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, the largest history museum in the state and the home of one of the Southwest’s finest art collections. The Buffaloes are a member of the NCAA Division II Lone Star Conference and offers 14 men’s and women’s athletics programs.

Photo: Longtime West Texas A&M University Golf fan Rick Couch, left, has made a major gift to support the program. He's pictured with Coach Meredith Jameson.

—WT—