The Bainbridge High School boys varsity golf team boasts several star returners this season, and one new face: the head coach.

New as he is to the position, Joe Lanza’s résumé shows he is clearly the man for the job.

Lanza, a member of the Bainbridge High Class of 2001, stepped into the roll of head coach this season. He is a mathematics teacher at BHS and was a four-year varsity letter during his own time on the team.

Lanza was also the 2004 Washington State Amateur Champion, the 2005 WCC Player of the Year and holds a course record 59 at Wing Point Golf & Country Club.

“When [former Head Coach] Tom [Zuzelski] left, I definitely raised my hand pretty quickly,” Lanza said of his decision to get involved.

Though he admits to being on the wrong side of the learning curve when it comes to knowledge of the team’s competition, and the layout of some of the away courses, Lanza said his familiarity with many of the players and his own years of playing experience made him comfortable enough to take over the program.

He plans no drastic changes to either the team’s structure or practice routine, he said, and is approaching his new position with the calm and conversational attitude his students say is in keeping with his classroom teaching style.

“He teaches and coaches in the same manner,” said returning team member Nate Boegl.

Lanza said he is also optimistic about the team’s chances this season, citing their several key returners from last year’s undefeated regular season and promising freshmen additions.

His goal now, he said, is to keep things moving in the same direction.

“I never want to feel like an authority figure,” Lanza explained. “I want them to want to know it. I always went to school and it was always so much different where it was, ‘You need to know this because they say so.’ I hope that’s how I never come across coaching or teaching.”

Enthusiasm for golf ran high among potential team members earlier this season, and Lanza said that a record-breaking 32 students showed up for team tryouts.

“That’s kind of a change,” he said. “We actually had to make cuts this year because the golf courses don’t allow us to have that many players.”

Lanza credits the sport’s popularity on Bainbridge to the continued support the greater community, especially the team’s home course at Wing Point.

“I think it’s the right community,” he said. “Wing Point is pretty amazing to let us play out here and how they support junior golf.”

Assuming the role of team captain this year is BHS senior Hudson Hausmann.

“Just the perfect sort of citizen,” is how Lanza described his ideal team captain. “I don’t ever really have to let [Hausmann] know what that looks like; he already knows. He can help others do that as well. I think, at the beginning of the year, I played with him once during the summer and I asked him a bunch of questions about how things are run.”

The other seniors on the team are Carter Kraus and Brice Kozlosky.

The team’s season began at home Thursday, Sept. 11 against Eastside Catholic.