Wheeling University Athletics

One of only four females to be enshrined into the West Virginia State Golf Hall of Fame, Sue Vail will begin her 18th season as head coach of the women’s golf team at Wheeling University in 2022-2023.

Vail helped lead the program to their third MEC Championship in 2021 and led them to their first-ever team appearance at the NCAA Division II Atlantic Regional Tournament at Shoal Creek Country Club in Kansas City, Missouri. Vail was named the 2021 MEC Women's Golf Coach of the Year and Helped Emily Holzopfel earn the MEC Women's Golfer of the Year Award.

During the 2020-2021 season, Vail helped her team finish third at the MEC Championships for the third consecutive season. Emily Holzopfel finished third at the event, and was one of three All-MEC Players for the Wheeling Women's Golf team.

Vail's teams have won the Mountain East Conference Championship three times and have finished among the top-three teams in each season since the league's inception in 2013.

Under Vail's tutelage, Kasey Frazier was a four-time conference player of the year from 2013-16 and remains the only individual from a MEC institution to compete at the NCAA Championships when she placed 52nd overall in 2014 and tied for 26th overall in 2016. Frazier, who was the 2013 West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC) Player of the Year, also qualified for the national championships as a freshman and placed in a tie for 23rd at the 2013 National Championships.

In 2019, Vail got the call that she had become just the fourth female to be enshrined into the West Virginia State Golf Hall of Fame. Along with being inducted into the West Virginia State Golf Hall of Fame, Vail has also been inducted into the Dapper Dan Club and the Ohio Valley Legends of Golf.

Vail has had an active career in golf by winning the West Virginia Women’s Championship eight times (1976, 1984, 1985, 1988, 1989, 1992, 1993 and 1998) and is the only player to win in both match and stroke play. She also won six-straight West Virginia Senior Amateur championships from 1991-96. 

Vail has successfully played in many USGA Women’s Amateur events and was a member of the Virginias-Carolinas team for over 20 years.  She served as a seven-year member of the USGA Girl’s Junior Committee and helped run many national golfing events. 

Vail was born and raised in Wheeling.  She attended West Virginia University and Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. She has taught English locally and also in Fairfax County, Virginia and Yokohama, Japan.  Vail has served as a full-time and adjunct professor at Wheeling University for many years and is currently the secretary of the Board of Directors at the Moundsville Country Club, which the Cardinals claim as their home course.