Alicia Um Holmes - Women's Golf Coach

Alicia Um Holmes

Title:
Associate Head Coach
Alma Mater:
UCLA, '02
Year at UCLA:
3rd as Head Coach in 2025-26 (20th Overall)
Email:
aum@athletics.ucla.edu

Career Highlights
• Golfweek Women’s Coach of the Year (2023-2024)
• WGCA Assistant Coach of the Year (2013-2014)
• 2011 NCAA Champion Assistant Coach

Biography
Alicia Um Holmes enters her third season as head coach of the UCLA women’s golf program in 2025-26. Um Holmes was selected to lead the Bruins on May 25, 2023, and made an immediate impact in her first season with a runner-up finish at the NCAA Championships earning her 2023-24 Golfweek Women’s Coach of the Year.

Um Holmes spent 17 years as an assistant and associate head coach for the Bruins under UCLA Athletic Hall of Famer Carrie Forsyth from 2006-23, helping guide UCLA to the 2011 NCAA Championship, five NCAA Regionals titles and two Pac-12 Championships. Um Holmes has also been a member of three national runner-up squads (2007-08, 2008-09 and 2023-24).

Um Holmes has continued UCLA’s strong history of success with a pair of NCAA Championship appearances and five team victories over her first two seasons as head coach. Most recently in 2024-25, UCLA advanced to its 35th NCAA Championships after completing an unlikely postseason run. The Bruins exacted a seventh-place finish at their first-ever Big Ten Championship to qualify for the NCAA Tournament with a .500 winning percentage (65-64-1). A solid first two rounds at the NCAA Charlottesville Regional gave UCLA a healthy 10-stroke buffer above the cut line to propel them to nationals. The Bruins secured key finishes earlier in their spring schedule that were essential in keeping postseason hopes alive. UCLA clinched its first win of the season at the Bruin Wave Invitational in February and, one month later, finished fourth at the highly-competitive PING/ASU Invitational.

In her two seasons leading the program, Um Holmes has coached a pair WGCA All-America honorees with First Team selection Zoe Antoinette Campos and honorable mention recipient Caroline Canales. Campos was also named one of 10 finalists for college golf’s top honor, the ANNIKA Award, in 2023-24. Two Bruins – Campos and Francesca Fiorellini – have earned all-conference recognition since Um Holmes took the reins.

Um Holmes completed a remarkable first season in 2023-24, resulting in a runner-up finish at the NCAA Championships, four team stroke play wins and numerous individual accolades and records. Um Holmes was awarded the Golfweek Women’s Coach of the Year for the team’s success. She was also a finalist for WGCA National Coach of the Year.

UCLA was victorious in Um Holmes’ second tournament as head coach at the Windy City Collegiate Classic where the Bruins ousted nine top-25 teams with a score of -32, 832 to tie the lowest 54-hole mark in program history. UCLA had a stretch of three consecutive wins to begin the spring at The Match in the Desert, the Nanea Pac-12 Preview and The Show. The four wins were the most for the program since the 2017-18 season. UCLA also secured its second straight Battle for the Bell title over crosstown rival USC in the fall with a convincing 4-1 victory. The Bruins’ memorable postseason run began by making the eight-team cut line for match play at the NCAA Championships. UCLA toppled Texas A&M in the Quarterfinals, 3-0-2, and Oregon in the Semifinals, 3-1-1, before falling to top-seeded Stanford in the Finals, 3-2. The result marked the fifth runner-up finish in program history.

Six of Um Holmes’ eight golfers recorded multiple top-10 individual finishes in 2023-24. The Bruins’ top performer was Campos, a consensus First Team All-American and ANNIKA Award Finalist, who led the team in scoring average (70.7), wins (4), top 10s (9), top 20s (10), rounds under par (21) and counting round percentage (32/32) for a second straight season. Campos’ four medals were tied for the most in UCLA single-season history and her 21 rounds under par set a program single-season record. Canales was also awarded WGCA Honorable Mention All-America acclaim for the first time in her career. Canales put on a dominant show in the match play portion of the NCAA Championships with a perfect 3-0-0 record. On the Pac-12 awards circuit, Campos was named to the First Team while three Bruins were recognized as Honorable Mention: Canales, Meghan Royal and Kate Villegas.

Over Um Holmes’ 19 years at UCLA, the Bruins have produced two ANNIKA Award winners, which is given annually to the top female Division I collegiate golfer, in Alison Lee (2014) and Bronte Law (2016), as well as two WGCA Player of the Year honorees in Law (2016) and Lilia Vu (2018). Eleven UCLA golfers have hauled in 22 WGCA First Team All-America awards with Um Holmes on staff. No school won more Pac-10/12 Golfer of the Year awards than UCLA once Um Holmes joined the staff, with four Bruin golfers – Tiffany Joh, Lee, Law and Vu – taking home the honor five times. UCLA’s four Pac-10/12 Newcomer of the Year awards since 2006 trailed only one school.

Several of Um Holmes and Forsyth’s golfers are flourishing in the professional ranks. Current LPGA stars who Um Holmes helped recruit to UCLA are Law, Lee, Vu, Brianna Do, Ryann O’Toole and Patty Tavatanakit. Tavatanakit became the first Bruin to win a major championship event since Melissa “Mo” Martin in 2014 at the 2021 Chevron Championship. Vu had her breakout season in 2023, ascending to World No. 1 and earning Rolex Player of the Year after winning two major championships – the Chevron Championship and AIG Women’s Open – and two other events at the Honda LPGA Thailand and The ANNIKA driven by Gainbridge at Pelican. Vu owns five total victories on the LPGA Tour and has accumulated up to $6.8 million in career earnings.

Five golfers from the Um Holmes and Forsyth era have represented their country at the Olympics. Most recently, four Bruins competed at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games: Emma Spitz (Austria), Patty Tavatanakit (Thailand), Mariajo Uribe (Colombia) and Lilia Vu (USA). Uribe, making her third Olympic appearance and competing in her final event as a professional, notched the highest finish by a Bruin at the Olympics with a T-10th placement.

Years Prior to Becoming Head Coach
Alongside retired UCLA head coach Carrie Forsyth, Um Holmes helped guide the Bruins to the 2011 NCAA Championship, five NCAA Regional titles and two Pac-12 Championships. Beginning her first year as an assistant in 2006, Um Holmes and Forsyth went on a dominant run of five consecutive seasons with top three finishes at both the conference championships and Regionals. They placed top three at nationals in four of those five years. As an assistant and associate head, Um Holmes coached 32 All-Pac-12 First Team selections and was a part of 54 UCLA tournament victories.

Following the 2013-14 season, Um Holmes was voted the WGCA Assistant Coach of the Year. That year, the Bruins won the NCAA Regional in Stillwater, Oklahoma and placed third at nationals.

Um Holmes was a student-athlete at UCLA from 1997-02, playing three seasons under Forsyth and one year for UCLA Athletic Hall of Famer Jackie Steinmann before graduating with a degree in economics. Um earned All-Pac-10 Honorable Mention accolades when she tied for 12th place at the Pac-10 Championship her senior season in 2002. She averaged a career-best 75.7 scoring average in 32 rounds, with three top 20 finishes that year. In her UCLA career, Um made 37 starts, played 107 rounds and averaged 77.2.

Prior to her appointment at UCLA, Um worked in the hospitality and golf industries as well as for an information systems company. For the 2005 calendar year, she competed on the West Coast Ladies Golf Tour, qualified to play on the Futures Tour and participated in the LPGA Qualifying School.

Um played three years at Newbury Park High School before spending her senior year at Westlake High and graduating in 1997. She won the 1996 SCGA Jr. Match Play Championship and played in the 1997 and ‘99 U.S. Women’s Amateur Championships.

In June of 2008, Um married Steve Holmes and the couple resides in Simi Valley.

Alicia Um Holmes’ Year-by-Year UCLA Head Coaching Record

Season	Events	Team Wins	Top 5’s	Individual Wins	Conf. Finish	Regionals Finish	NCAA Finish
2023-24	12	4	9	4	4th (Pac-12)	4th	T-6th (Stroke Play)/2nd (Match Play)
2024-25	12	1	4	1	7th (Big Ten)	5th	12th (Stroke Play)
Totals	24	5	13	5	0 Conf. Titles	2 Regionals App.	2 NCAA App.