To win a state championship in golf, the secret formula for East Gaston High School was to throw a little of everything into the mix and see what came about.

The 1977 team, which won the WNCHSAA title, was led by a junior who’d rather play football, a former football coach who coached basketball, a girl who played off the men’s tees and a group of guys – including one comedian – who had to leave the county just to practice.

Together, they compiled a three-year record of 69-3 against the state’s toughest opponents and formed a bond that Coach Larry Armstrong still pulls memories from, 40 years later.

“I inherited a bunch of really good golfers. And I didn’t have but one rule,” he says. “They couldn’t play on my team unless they could beat me. And they didn’t have any trouble doing that. One of those years, the guys were so good that we might have three, four, five of them who could shoot in the 60s, and they’d be mad if they didn’t break par.”

This Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame team consisted of seniors T.R. Reid, Mark Lingerfelt, David Boaz, Jimmy Buff and Darren Emmett, and underclassmen Royce Hawley, David Craig, Grant Hoffman, Jeff Shirley, Jeff Williams, Donna Green and Mark Stroupe.

Armstrong, also the school’s basketball coach and a former football assistant at Stanley High School, says the team’s strength wasn’t what opponents would expect.

“The team that won the championship, I didn’t have the best team overall but I had the best workers,” Armstrong says. “Most of the guys, except Grant and David Boaz, didn’t hit the ball that far, but they were accurate with chipping and putting, and that’s what would rattle the other teams so bad. The other teams would hit the ball long off the tee, and we might not but we’d chip and putt and beat them. And that’s because they practiced in the offseason.”

Practices were held at Pine Island Country Club in Charlotte and Green Meadows in Mount Holly. “Pine Island probably made the biggest difference in their game. Green Meadows didn’t have any sand traps, but Pine Island had it all,” Armstrong says. “The people were so gracious to let us play our matches there.”

It was common, during matches, for players to share information about their home course with those who’d never played it. And East Gaston went up against some of the state’s finest – Crest, Kings Mountain, R-S Central, East Rutherfordton, South Point. Still, sportsmanship is sportsmanship.

“One of my players, Darren Emmett, he had a way of getting on the other team’s nerves. Now, he didn’t do anything wrong, but he was funny,” Armstrong says. “We were playing Shelby at Pine Island, and Darren was big, about 6-foot-2 and 225, a big guy. And if someone hadn’t played the course before, they’d ask an opponent about the hole, and they’d tell them, exact. So the Shelby guy had a second shot on a par-4, and the guy asked Darren and Darren told him. And the guy says, ‘I don’t think it’s that far.’ So he flew it way down the fairway, way too far, and Darren says, ‘It’s deceiving, ain’t it?’”

Hoffman, who played quarterback at EGHS from 1975 through 1977 and college golf at Limestone before turning pro, was a team leader, even though a slight misunderstanding kept Hoffman from being a three-sport athlete.

“I asked him why he didn’t go out for basketball, told him he could have helped our team. And he said that between junior high and high school, I talked to him about being the back-up for our No. 1 point guard, and that hurt his feelings, so he didn’t go out,” Armstrong says. “He didn’t want to be a back-up. Sometimes, though, you say things so that people can prove you wrong.”

If anyone thought a girl couldn’t play a boys game, Donna Green proved them wrong. “We didn’t have a girls team, and she wanted to play golf. She was excellent,” Armstrong says. Green, who later married and had a son, attended UNC-Charlotte on a golf scholarship after graduating from East Gaston in 1978. She died in August, 2009.

“The teams I had were so gifted, and a lot of those kids belonged to Pine Island Country Club, or played a lot with their parents, and I was just fortunate to have them,” Armstrong says. “Then there’s Kevin Spittle, who was instrumental in building our golf program but wasn’t there that last year, and Lisa Campbell and Sandy Ness, who were our scorekeepers.

“After we won the western part of the state, the following year the championship became the whole state. I guess we were the outlaws. And that’s the year I gave up coaching.

“It never crossed my mind to be in the Hall of Fame. It was just a shock and a surprise. It was the best thing, though, being able to work with those young people.”