Menne happy to be alive, at UML

By Barry Scanlon

UMass Lowell senior Chris Menne would like nothing more than to win the East/Northeast Super Regional golf tournament, May 7-9, in Wheeling, West Va.

But if he doesn't advance to the national tournament, it won't be the end of the world for the 24-year-old.

"I used to take golf pretty seriously in high school," the Edgartown native and Martha's Vineyard Regional High School graduate said. "But I probably have more fun now."

Nearly dying in a car accident a month into freshman year of college will change a person's outlook on life in a hurry.

"I think I'm pretty lucky," Menne said of surviving a September 2000 car crash in South Carolina, 40 miles outside Clemson University, where Menne had just started college.

His friend was driving when a truck "pushed" their car off the road. The friend, who was wearing a seat belt, was not injured. Menne normally wore a seat belt. Earlier in the night, however, during the drive from Atlanta, where Menne had visited with his mother, he took off his seat belt to get something in the back seat.

The decision not to put his seat belt back on nearly cost him his life, when the car flipped over "five or six" times. Menne crashed threw a window and landed 20 feet from the car. He suffered a broken arm, broken hip and, worst of all, a fractured skull.

Luckily, Menne remembers little about the accident.

He returned home to Massachusetts after a month's hospital stay. When he returned to Clemson, he made it through second semester, but withdrew from school during the third semester. His memory was spotty and he felt terrible.

He enrolled at UMass Amherst the next year, but lasted only two semesters.

"I just wasn't into school," Menne said.

In 2004, looking for a smaller school, he began taking classes at UMass Lowell. Immediately, he felt at home. During the first year, however, he had no idea UML even had a golf team.

"I had no intention of playing golf," Menne said.

For the past two years, however, Menne has been the River Hawks' star. He qualified for the East/Northeast Super Regional last spring and this year he's earned the No. 3 individual seed for the tournament as a result of a fall average of 79.96 and a spring average of 78.92.

He has scored in the 70s in 14 of 24 rounds during his senior season. He placed third out of a field of 74 at the Dowling Invitational.

"It's hard for me to even put into words," Menne said of his three-school journey and brush with death. "I can deal with adversity a lot better. I've had so much fun playing here the last two years."

UML head coach Gary Mucica says Menne is a tremendous teammate and someone who takes great pride in being a 24-year-old senior.

During a recent match at Yale, the starter, at Mucica's urging, announced Menne at the first tee as a "seventh-year senior."

A beaming Menne basked in the applause, saying, "That's me, baby!"

"He thought it was hilarious," Mucica said. "He's really found a home at UMass Lowell."