Vanessa Wang is in her third season as an assistant coach at Vanderbilt after joining the Commodores prior to the start of the 2023-24 season.
During her second season in Nashville in 2024-25, Wang assisted the Commodores to a fourth-consecutive NCAA Championship appearance and a 16th-place finish. Sophomore Ava Merrill reached the final round of individual stroke play, finishing tied for 14th and earning All-America honors. Wang also helped the Dores excel in the classroom as six student-athletes were named Academic All-Americans and the team boast a 3.94 spring GPA, best in Vanderbilt athletics history.
In her first season with the Dores, Wang helped guide the squad to a third-straight NCAA Championships appearance. Vanderbilt finished 20th at the Championships, its best performance since 2013-14. She helped guide Tillie Claggett to All-SEC honors and Ava Merrill to All-SEC Freshman team recognition.
During the regular season, Vanderbilt posted seven top five finishes, including two wins, in Wang’s first season on staff. She also helped develop Ginnie Ding and Celina Sattelkau, both of whom went on to earn status on the Ladies European Tour following graduation in 2024. Sattelkau was also awarded the WGCA Dinah Shore Trophy.
She joined the Commodore staff after competing for five seasons as a student-athlete at Cal Poly.
During the 2022-23 academic year Wang served as a donor and engagement specialist for Cal Poly Athletics, a role that saw her execute the creation and management of athletic special events including donor engagement activities, individual team events and alumni relations. She was also the tournament director for the Mustang men’s program’s Cal Poly Invitational at the Preserve Golf Club at the end of the 2022 fall season, where she managed a staff that helped run a college-amateur and donor engagement events in addition to directing tournament operations, and helped organize alumni weekends for the department’s football, baseball, golf, and track and field programs.
Wang worked multiple years as a counselor at Stanford’s annual summer golf camps and was on staff at the Friendly Hills Country Club as well.
Over the course of five seasons with the Mustangs, Wang recorded a stroke average of 75.20 with 23 rounds at or under par and 17 top-20 finishes while helping the team to three straight Big West Conference championships and NCAA Regional appearances. She was an all-tournament selection in 2023 after tying for fourth-place individually as Cal Poly claimed the tournament title by an 11-stroke margin, and would go on to shoot an even-par 72 in her final round at the collegiate level at the NCAA Pullman Regional. Wang ended the campaign with a 74.8 scoring average highlighted by a season-best 69 on the final of the Anuenue Spring Break Classic hosted by Hawai’i.
Wang also posted a 74.8 stroke average the previous season, and she led Cal Poly with a scoring average of 75.3 in 2020-21 when she recorded four top-10 results. That included placing among the top 10 at the Big West Championships and shooting a career-low 67 in the final round of the Fresno State Classic.
A Big West All-Academic Team member, Wang graduated from Cal Poly in 2023 with a degree in sport management as well as a exercise and sports studies minor.
Wang is originally from Rowland Heights, California, where she helped lead La Serna High School to a fifth-place finish in the California Interscholastic Federation state championships in 2016 and four San Gabriel Valley League titles. She won the Lizette Salas Junior Championship in her final American Junior Golf Association event, adding nine top-10 results on the Southern California PGA Toyota Tour Cup in 2017 and 11 victories on the PGA Southern California Junior Tour during her prep career. In 2018, Wang qualified for the USGA Fourball Championship.
The Wang File
- 5 team wins
- 1 WGCA All-American
- 8 Academic All- Americans
- 3 SEC Honors
- 2 Individual Wins
- 2 LET Pros