Author: lenz

Pavel leads latest of Champions’ bunched up major tourneys

The Constellation Senior Players Championship, in progress at Exmoor Country Club in Highland Park, could be the last major golf championship in the Chicago area for quite awhile. None of the pro tours have such a tournament scheduled here after the last putt drops at Exmoor on Sunday.

On PGA Tour Champions, however, majors are a little different. The 50-and-over circuit holds five of them each year. They’re 72-hole events, while most of the regular tour stops are 54 holes.

The scheduling of them is also on the weird side. This is what Scott McCarron, defending champion in the Senior Players, calls “Major Season.’’

The Senior Players is the middle major in a three-tournament stretch. David Toms won the U.S. Senior Open two weeks ago and the tour didn’t have a tournament the following week. The circuit is also idle for a week after the Senior Players before another major, the Senior British Open, tees off. No other pro tour schedules like that.

“I think it’s great,’’ said McCarron. “I love playing four-day events. I love playing where they get the golf courses tough, so it’s great to play three in six weeks basically. It’s a lot of fun for us.’’

Scott Parel had the most fun on Friday, shooting a 6-under-par 66 to take a one-stroke lead midway through the championship. Parel, at 11-under-par 133, leads Brandt Jobe and Jeff Maggert by one stroke and some of the circuit’s more high-profile stars – McCarron among them – are in a seven-way tie for fourth, two shots back.

Maggert dropped out of a share for the lead when he finished his round with a three-putt bogey at No. 18 on Friday. McCarron also lost a shot – and a share of second place – with a bogey at the last.

“When you make a bogey on the last hole with a sand wedge (for your approach), that’s really disappointing,’’ said McCarron. “But I’m in the mix, so it’s all right.’’

Among those joining McCarron at 9-under are Kenny Perry, the co-first-round leader with Illinois coach Mike Small; Bernhard Langer, the man McCarron upset in last year’s tournament at Caves Valley in Maryland; and the always dangerous Vijay Singh.

Small dropped into a tie for 11th after shooting a 71. Langer had won the Senior Players three years in a row before finishing second to McCarron last year. Now they could duel again in the final 36 holes at Exmoor.

If Parel hangs on to win it would be a surprise. He came to golf late, after working 10 years in the computer industry. He didn’t play college golf and didn’t turn pro until he was 31 years old.. An early starter on Friday, he didn’t think his score would hold up for the lead after his round was over – but it did.

“If the conditions stay the same you’re going to have to shoot the same kind of scores that I’ve shot the last two days to have a chance to win,’’ said Parel. “The course is in perfect shape. The greens are perfect. So guys are going to make a lot of birdies out there.’’

McCarron likes the course but doesn’t feel his defending champion status means much.

“Defending champion doesn’t mean much unless you’re coming back to the same golf course you won at,’’ he said. “Then you have some good positive vibes. Exmoor was a completely new golf course to me and a lot of guys.’’

He’s been battling a sore right ankle that will require surgery when the season is over.

“It’ll be on the ligament that goes right through the ankle. They’ll reattach it,’’ he said. “It doesn’t bother me playing golf. It just bothers me walking. Now it’s starting to bother me under the ball of the foot, so pushing off is difficult. I’m limping around, but that’s the way it goes.’’

Friday’s low score was a 64 by Peter Lonard, who climbed from a tie for 46th place into a tie for 15th. Fifty-six of the 78 starters are under par for the first 36 holes. Today’s play starts at 8 a.m. with Parel, Jobe and Maggert going off last at 10 a.m.

Illini coach Small shares first-round lead at Senior Players tourney

Illinois coach Mike Small started Friday’s second round of the Constellation Senior Players Championship in a tie for the lead and then made birdies on his first two holes. The good times didn’t last for long, however.

Small dropped back after that and finished with a 71. That didn’t knock him out of contention going into the weekend rounds at Exmoor Country Club, but the focus shifted – for awhile at least – to how his Illini stars of the last four seasons are doing in their first two months as touring pros.

Dylan Meyer earned over $200,000 in his first two starts and Nick Hardy made the cut in all four of his tournaments. Both will play on the weekend at the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic after getting into the field on sponsor exemptions.

“Dylan is one of the most talented players I’ve ever coached and Nick is probably the biggest grinder and the most competitive player I’ve ever coached,’’ said Small, “so between those two guys they’ve got a good future.’’

Meyer was in Champaign last weekend and worked with Small on his putting before heading to the John Deere.

“I watched them (on TV) last night and keep tabs on the guys. They know that,’’ said Small. “We keep in touch.’’

As for his own playing future at least Small is having no trouble getting into tournaments. He is playing at Exmoor because he squeezed into the top 70 on PGA Tour Champions’ Charles Schwab Cup money list. He needed to hole a chip shot on his last hole in his last tournament in Madison, Wis., to do it.

That got him into the major at Exmoor and – because he was a top-10 finisher in Madison – he can also play in the 3M tournament in Minnesota after that.

Then comes the Illinois Open, which Small has won four times, and the Illinois PGA Championship, which Small has won a record 12 times. The Illinois PGA Championship ends on the day classes resume in Champaign. After that Small’s strictly a coach again, but he believes his tournament play now helps his recruiting.

“I’m going out to the U.S. Junior next week for three days,’’ he said. “What better conversation piece for recruits than this: I played with Bernhard (Langer) the Saturday of the tournament in Wisconsin, and that was a great learning experience for me. What better way for a coach to still be learning, still growing?’’

As far as playing goes he has no goals.

“If I still have fun doing it, if I still get nervous and still get a little anxiety, that’s good,’’ he said. “I’ve had a heckuva run. Golf has been very good to me. If I can do this for three or four more years and still be competitive I’ll do it. If I’m not competitive I won’t.’’

Crosby is a surprise leader after Round 1 of Senior Women’s Open

Scotland’s Trish Johnson is the only woman to have won a major senior tournament. She won the only one – the first Senior LPGA Championship last fall – and she got off to a good start on making it two-for-two in Thursday’s first round of the inaugural U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Chicago Golf Club in Wheaton.

She’s not leading, though. Elaine Crosby, a late starter, posted a 3-under-par 70 to claim a one-stroke lead on Johnson, Sweden’s Liselotte Neumann and England’s Laura Davies. Crosby, 60, plays on The Legends Tour.

Johnson, who led wire to wire in the Senior LPGA Championship at Indiana’s French Lick Resort, won’t be able to go wire to wire at Chicago Golf Club, and Crosby, a former member of the LPGA Tour who lives in Jackson, Mich., wasn’t her only problem in the first round. Johnson encountered a couple things that were unnerving.

For one, though she was in the second threesome to tee off, there was a wait at the first tee. Opening ceremonies involved remarks by Mike Davis, executive director of the U.S. Golf Association, and a stirring rendition of The National Anthem by Grammy winner Heather Headley. Then came the opening tee shot by JoAnne Carner, a ready-made photo op for fans who stood four-deep at 7 a.m. to celebrate the long-awaited national championship for women 50 and over.

“A 20-minute wait or so on the first tee, it was quite nerve-racking, to be honest,’’ said Johnson after posting her 71.

Then there was the pin position at the par-3 10th hole. Johnson put her tee shot on the 136-yard hole on the back of the green, then rolled her downhill putt past the cup, off the green and into a bunker. Playing partner Helen Alfredsson of Sweden did the same thing and so did former U.S. Women’s Open champions Pat Bradley and Amy Alcott.

“If you’re behind the flag you cannot stop it. You’ve got to be either short or to the side,’’ said Johnson, who apparently is learning fast about America’s first 18-hole course that is hosting its 12th U.S. Golf Association championship but only the second for women. The first was the U.S. Women’s Amateur way back in 1903.

Chicago Golf Club offered a look this week’s players don’t see very much. Spectators can walk with them in the fairways. There are no gallery ropes, just directional markers around the greens.

That’s not the only difference from her first major win at French Lick, a Pete Dye design.

“French Lick is harder than this course,’’ said Johnson. “The fairways here are a lot wider. French Lick’s aren’t at all; You can hardly see any of them. And here it’s four rounds walking, which is not something you do on The Legends Tour.

Crosby qualified for this Senior Open at Conway Farms in Lake Forest, shooting a 72 to earn one of the five spots offered there. A big supporter of The Legends Tour, she has hosted its Wendy’s Charity Classic tournament for the last 16 years.

“Hopefully The Legends will gain momentum from this Senior Open,’’ said Crosby. “It’ll show that we can play. We may not have a lot of tournaments, but we do have a lot of pro-ams and we’re really good at those.’’

Davies – one of the expected contenders — finished her round in style, making eagle on the 18th hole. She hit a good drive on the 425-yard par-5 and put a 7-iron approach from 168 yards to 10 feet. She played with Juli Inkster and Neumann, and they’ll be paired again in today’s second round.

Neumann and Davies go way back. They played together in 1979 in the European Junior Championship. Inkster, the third member of the threesome, is still active on the LPGA Tour but she couldn’t keep up with the two Europeans. Poor putting has hampered her much of this season, but that wasn’t the problem on Thursday.

“I hit the ball like crap,’’ she said. “I drove really bad and played defensive all day. I hit maybe four fairways with my driver, and that’s been my best club all year. But it could have been a lot worse. I’m just excited that I actually putted pretty good.’’

So did Jamie Fischer, the director of instruction at Conway Farms. A qualifier for the tournament at her home club, Fischer started the finals with a 1-over-74 and is tied for 11th place after Round 1.

Carner, the star of the show at the first tee in early morning, made birdie on the last hole to shoot her age – a 79.

Socializing is over; now things get serious at first U.S. Senior Women’s Open

So far the inaugural U.S. Senior Women’s Open has been a feel-good story — the long-overdue creation of a national championship for women golfers who have passed their 50th birthday.

They’re delighted the U.S. Golf Association added the event to its schedule, and it’s brought a lot of former professional and amateur competitors together again. In fact, the atmosphere at Chicago Golf Club over the last three days even resembled a high school reunion, especially at Tuesday night’s players’ dinner.

“It was a lot of people just having fun, meeting old acquaintances, catching up with people,’’ said Juli Inkster, one of the favorites to be at the top of the leaderboard after the regulation 72 holes wrap up on Sunday at the Wheaton layout that became America’s first 18-hole course in 1893.

Now the socializing is over, and it’s down to business with the challenge of becoming the first champion of the USGA’s newest national championship on the line for 120 players from the original entry of 462. The finalists will tee off starting at 7 a.m., with JoAnne Carner having the honor of smacking the first tee shot.

Carner had a brilliant amateur and professional career. She won an NCAA title, a U.S. Junior crown, five U.S. Amateurs, two U.S. Opens and 43 Ladies PGA tournaments. She deserves the honor of hitting the first ball, but Carner is 79 now and her chances of winning this week are slim and none.

She has fought recent hip problems and spent 2 ½ weeks of the last month on a boat trip to the Bahamas. That’s hardly conducive to good preparation for a big tournament. Still, Carner walked 18-hole practice rounds the last three days in 90-degree heat, and said with a grin “I’m always ready. I’ve been waiting 29 years for this. I was hoping I’d still be alive to play in it.’’

Carner will probably do just fine, but there figures to be just four main challenges for the coveted title. Inkster is one, mainly because she still plays frequently against the young stars on the LPGA circuit.

Hampered by putting problems, she hasn’t had a good year, though. Inkster shot 79-77 and missed the cut in the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Kemper Lakes, in Kildeer, two weeks ago. She is switching back to a cross-handed putting grip this week after using a claw most of the season.

“My path was bad,’’ she said. “I don’t know how you get into these funks, but I do.’’

She been working with her club professional husband Brian to correct the problem, but the results haven’t been encouraging so far.

“He’s been drinking a lot this week, poor guy,’’ quipped Inkster.

The member of the favorite foursome who would seem to be the best bet to win is Scotland’s Trish Johnson, mainly because she was the winner of the only previous major championship for senior women. She led wire to wire in the Senior LPGA Championship last fall at French Lick Resort in Indiana. Johnson also won a Legends event in Washington this year.

Two other foreign players – Sweden’s Liselotte Neumann and England’s Laura Davies – are the other members of the favored foursome. Neumann, winner of 13 LPGA titles and 11 European Tour events, has also won three times on the Legends Tour, for LPGA stars of the past who have reached their 45th birthday.

Davies, a World Golf Hall of Famers, has remained competitive on the LPGA Tour. She is Inkster’s favorite to win this week.

“I don’t know about being the favorite,’’ said Davies, “but the USGA is taking this seriously because it’s an inaugural event. It’s the real deal. The USGA has done the players proud, and hopefully now we’ll do them proud with our performances on the course.’’

Though that foursome appears to be the class of the field, there are some other interesting possibilities.

Jane Blalock is the founder of the Legends Tour, and Suzy Whaley will soon become the first female president of the PGA of America. Blalock got in the field as a sponsor’s exemption and Whaley survived sectional qualifying. So did Kay Cockerill, a former LPGA player who converted into a tournament analyst for The Golf Channel.

Cockerill will have her husband Danny as her caddie. He was on her bag during Cockerill’s years on the LPGA Tour but hasn’t carried since Kay’s failed attempt at a U.S. Open qualifying round in 2006.

There is also a sister duo in the field. Hollis Stacy was a three-time U.S. Women’s Open champion. Her sister, Martha Leach won a U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur. The last time they played together in a tournament was in 1990, at the U.S. Open.

Chicago schedule nightmare ends with Singh’s victory at Exmoor

HIGHLAND PARK, IL. – PGA Tour Champions is a funny circuit, especially when it comes to scheduling its major championships. While the other pro tours spread their majors throughout the schedule, the 50-and over men bunch theirs up.

That’s not all bad, just weird compared to the other pro tours. There are five majors for PGA Tour Champions players, and the fourth of this year was a dandy, Vijay Singh beating Jeff Maggert on the second hole of a playoff after both covered the regulation 72 holes in 20-under-par at Exmoor Country Club in the Constellation Senior Players Championship.

The five Champions majors fall in a stretch of seven tournaments. The first teed off on May 17 and the last putt drops on the final one, the British Senior Open at St. Andrews, on July 29. There were two bye weeks in that stretch of big events.

Scott McCarron, a perennial contender in them all, calls it “our Majors Season.’’ He professes to like the schedule the way it is, but not all the players feel that way.

“We’d like to see them spaced out more, and we’ve been trying to do it,’’ said Fred Funk. But so far that hasn’t been possible.

The tournament scheduling in Illinois hasn’t been all that great this year, either.

When one of the LPGA majors, the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, came to Chicago two weeks ago. It was scheduled opposite the 118th playing of the prestigious Women’s Western Amateur, but that was a minor conflict compared to last week’s when the Senior Players – which has the strongest field among the PGA Tour Champions majors — went head-to-head with Illinois’ only annual PGA Tour event, the John Deere Classic, as well as the inaugural U.S. Senior Women’s Open.

Those three tournaments had the same July 12-15 dates. If each had been held on weeks away from the other that event would have been a highlight of the Chicago golf season. Put on the same dates, all suffered to some extent.

The Senior Players and Women’s Senior Open both struggled to find volunteers. The John Deere Classic had major weather problems but it did land Steve Stricker, the only player in the Champions Tour’s top 70 money winners that didn’t go to the Senior Players. (The Exmoor field was also without two of the circuit’s most popular players — Davis Love III, who played with his son Dru at the John Deere, and Fred Couples).

At least the Senior Players produced by far the most final-round excitement. Laura Davies won the U.S. Senior Women’s Open by 10 shots and Michael Kim took the John Deere Classic by eight. At Exmoor it was a two-man duel between playing partners Singh and Maggert in the final round.

Attendance-wise the Senior Players struggled on Thursday and Friday, when the Senior Women’s Open was making its dramatic debut at Chicago Golf Club an hour’s drive to the west away. The John Deere was another two hours from Chicago Golf Club. The real action in the end, though, came at Exmoor – a private club that dates back to 1896.

One message from this event was that PGA Tour Champions has shed its image as a showcase for Bernhard Langer. He isn’t as dominant as he used to be. Langer had won the Senior Players three straight years before finishing second in 2017. At Exmoor he was eight strokes back in a tie for 17th.

Singh became the seventh different champion in the last seven Champions majors. Langer has won only one of those seven – the 2017 U.S. Senior Open. The other winners in that stretch were Miguel Angel Jimenez, Scott McCarron, Kenny Perry, Paul Broadhurst and David Toms.

In his younger days Singh won both the Masters and PGA Championship among his 34 titles on the PGA Tour and he also won 22 times internationally. The Senior Players marked his third win and first major on PGA Tour Champions.

“It was a little different (than his earlier majors),’’ said Singh, “but any time you win it’s an accomplishment. The Champions Tour is a little more relaxed, but a win is a win.’’

U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Chicago Golf Club is a real feel-good story

WHEATON, IL. –The inaugural U.S. Senior Women’s Open, which teed off on Thursday in the Chicago suburb of Wheaton, has been a celebration of women’s golf. It resembled a high school reunion, too, with the best pros and amateurs of the past re-connecting during three days of practice rounds and pre-tournament activities.

More than anything, though, this tournament for women who have reached their 50th birthday was overdue. In fact, it was long, long overdue.

JoAnne Carner – the only woman owning titles in the U.S. Girls Junior, the U.S. Women’s Amateur and the U.S. Women’s Open — said she had been waiting for the Senior event for 29 years; she’s now 79.

“I was just hoping I’d still be alive to play in it,’’ Carner said.

Jane Blalock first presented the concept of a senior tournament for women to the U.S. Golf Association after a captivating 1998 U.S. Women’s Open ended in a playoff victory by Korean Si Re Pak at Wisconsin’s Blackwolf Run. That tournament triggered a big change in the women’s game, giving it a more global appeal, but it didn’t change the USGA’s view on senior women playing with money on the line.

Blalock formed her own Legends Tour, which provided some competition for players after they turned 45 but had little support even from the LPGA. Last year – in an effort to beat the USGA to the punch – the LPGA conducted its first Senior LPGA Championship at Indiana’s French Lick Resort.

That only accentuated a glaring absence in the USGA tournament schedule. The organization already had a U.S. Junior, a U.S. Amateur, a U.S. Mid-Amateur, a U.S. Senior Amateur and a U.S. Senior Open for men and similar national championship for women with that one exception.

Despite years of pressure from fading stars on the Ladies PGA Tour (and some of the top amateurs as well), the USGA was reluctant to find a place for a U.S. Senior Women’s Open and — once a commitment was made — it took three years in the planning stages to launch the tournament.

Finally, on Thursday at historic Chicago Golf Club, Carner smacked the first tee shot and the event became a reality. USGA executive director Mike Davis made some opening remarks at 6:45 a.m., then came a stirring rendition of the National Anthem by Grammy winner Heather Headley and player introductions by the legendary Nancy Lopez, who can’t play because of her knee problems and the walking-only requirement for the tournament.

After Carner’s 7 a.m. tee shot, made in front of a gallery standing four deep, there were even a few tears mixed in with the enthusiastic applause. Chunks of the gallery from the opening ceremonies followed each threesome, walking with the players down the fairway. It was a real feel-good thing all day long and will likely remain so until the first champion is crowned on Sunday.

The tourney’s reception in the Chicago area was a warm up, though it didn’t hurt one bit that it was held on America’s first 18-hole course. Chicago Golf Club is hosting its 12th USGA championship but the bulk of them were in the first two decades after the course opened in 1893. Prior to this week the last time the club opened its gates to the public was in 2005, for the Walker Cup matches.

Clearly there is a mystique about Chicago Golf Club, and Juli Inkster called it “a perfect place to hold this first one.’’

Lopez wasn’t the only former LPGA great missing from the field.

“We’re missing a few of the legends – the Beth Daniels, the Meg Mallons, the Kathy Whitworths and the Patty Sheehans,’’ said Inkster, “but we’ve got a lot of good ones.’’

The tournament drew 462 entries, and the starting field of 120 included 29 amateurs and 62 survivors of the nation-wide qualifying rounds. The finalists included players from 12 countries, with 95 from the U.S. They took on a course set up at 6,082 yards with a par of 73. Green speeds were around 12 on the Stimpmeter.

And there was decent crowd support despite some miserable planning by t being played on exactly the same dates as two other Illinois events — the Constellation Senior Players Championship, one of the five majors on PGA Tour Champions, and the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic.

The Senior Players event is at Exmoor Country Club, about an hour’s drive northeast of Chicago Golf Club, and the John Deere Classic is a two-hour drive to the west. Next year’s U.S. Senior Women’s Open will have the stage to itself, at Pine Needles in North Carolina.

Conway Farms pro carries Chicago hopes in U.S. Senior Women’s Open

The only Chicago area qualifier for the inaugural U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Chicago Golf Club is also the youngest in the 120-player field. Gurnee’s Jamie Fischer, who got in through the sectional qualifying round at Conway Farms, in Lake Forest, turned 50 on May 13.

Fischer grew up in Ohio and qualified for three U.S. Women’s Opens — the first when she was just 18 – and four LPGA Championships. Her mother, Andy Cohn-Fischer, played on the LPGA Tour in the 1960s after her graduation from Northwestern.

“When my mother went to Northwestern they had a girls’ team, but it wasn’t run the way the college teams are today,’’ said Fischer. “The Gleacher Center (the indoor practice facility for NU golf teams now) was a swimming pool back then. My mother had a different experience than the kids have today.’’

Jamie went to Texas on a golf scholarship and was an assistant women’s coach at Northwestern under then-head coach Chris Regenberg for several years before beginning her 11-year stint as director of instruction at Conway Farms.

While she has rarely competed in recent years, Fischer decided to try it after learning the Senior Women’s Open was coming, and it didn’t hurt that a sectional qualifier was at Conway Farms either. She shot 77 to finish third to claim one of the 62 finalists’ berths awarded to sectional qualifiers. Both her parents will be attending the finals.

In addition to the tournament practice days Fischer played Chicago Golf Club twice with members in recent weeks. Her mother played against Senior Women’s Open entrants JoAnne Carner, Hollis Stacey and Pat Bradley during her time on tour and Jamie has two college teammates in the field who also survived sectional qualifiers in Sue Ginter and Lisa DePaolo.

Oldest player in the field is Murle Breer, who is 79. Carner, the only woman to win the U.S. Girls Junior, U.S. Amateur and U.S. Open titles, is also 79. Carner will hit the first tee shot off the No. 1 tee at 7 a.m. on Thursday. The field includes players from 12 countries. Ten are 65 or older, and 29 are amateurs.

Bullington, India in JDC

Frankfort’s Brian Bullington and Deerfield’s Vince India survived Monday’s final qualifying round to earn spots in the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic. Illinois’ only annual PGA Tour event begins its four-day run at TPC Deere Run in Silvis on Thursday.

JDC qualifying has become a popular affair. An abundance of entrance necessitated two pre-qualifiers being held last week before Monday’s final elimination at Pinnacle Golf Club in Milan. Bullington was low man with an 8-under-par 63 and India tied for second after posting a 65. Both played collegiately at Iowa and have been struggling to get into tournaments on the Web.com Tour this season.

The PGA Tour also announced its 2018-19 schedule on Tuesday and it produced no change for the JDC. It will be held July 8-14 and remain the week before the British Open. As expected, the BMW Championship, which returns to the Chicago area in 2019 — but at Medinah instead of Conway Farms — shifts from September dates to Aug. 12-18 as the second event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs.

Here and there

The U.S. Golf Association will collaborate with the Chicago District Golf Association and Illinois Junior Golf Association on a Play9 Community Day on Saturday at Cantigny’s Youth Links in Wheaton. There’ll be a nine-hole round in the morning and a clinic for the participants at Chicago Golf Club from noon-2 p.m. while the Senior Women’s Open is in progress.

Tournament play won’t stop after the Senior Women’s Open and Constellation Senior Players Championship at Exmoor, in Highland Park, end on Sunday. The 24th Illinois Women’s Open begins its three-day run at Mistwood, in Romeoville, on Monday and the three-day 88th Illinois State Amateur starts the following day at Bloomington Country Club.

The Illinois PGA Senior Masters tournament will be held on Monday at Onwentsia, in Lake Forest. This year’s honorees are Don Habjan, from Makray Memorial in Barrington, and Ron Skubisz, from Pottawatomie in St. Charles.

Small will compete in Senior Players while 2 ex-Illini stars are in JDC

It isn’t that Mike Small hasn’t gotten into big golf tournaments before. The super successful men’s coach at the University of Illinois has remained a competitive player in large part by taking advantage of sponsor’s exemptions.

Small didn’t get an invitation to this week’s Constellation Senior Players Championship, which tees off at Exmoor Country Club in Highland Park on Thursday, however. It’s the third of the season’s five major events on PGA Tour Champions, and the only way Small could get into the field was by making it into the top 70 on the circuit’s Charles Schwab Cup money list.

“This is real special because you have to qualify to get in,’’ said Small. “I’m excited to have the opportunity to play. Majors are always something you get up for….majors are different.’’

So, at the same time that Dylan Meyer and Nick Hardy – the stars of Small’s Illini teams of the last four seasons – are playing in the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic in downstate Silvis, Ill., on sponsor exemptions the coach will be part of the strongest field of the season on the 50-and-over tour.

Small made it off his performances in three tournaments in which he received sponsor invites. He used those three starts to earn $103,895. That moved him to No. 68 on the Schwab Cup money list.

“I knew I had to have a top 10 finish in Wisconsin (the American Family Insurance Classic in Madison) to make the field,’’ said Small.

He barely made it thanks to a tie for 10th in a tournament organized by Steve Stricker that ended on June 24. Small and Stricker were teammates on Illini teams in the 1980s.

Two weeks before his strong finish in Wisconsin Small tied for ninth in the Principal Charity Classic in Iowa and he also had a tie for 24th in the Cologuard Classic in Arizona in March. Small learned that his spot in the Senior Players field was official while he was on the Exmoor course over the weekend.

“It’s always fun to play in front of Chicago fans,’’ said Small. “I played in the Western Open many times when it was at Cog Hill, and being at Exmoor is going to be a semi-home game for me. We have a lot of Illinois alumni and friends who are members at Exmoor. I’m excited to go up there to compete.’’

Vince Pellegrino, vice president of tournaments for the Western Golf Association – the manager of this Senior Players event, is excited, too.

“Mike’s well-known and respected throughout the Midwest, and we expect his presence to add an extra energy level and excitement to the championship,’’ said Pellegrino.

Interestingly, Stricker – one of the top players on PGA Tour Champions – will skip this major to compete in the John Deere Classic instead. He’s a three-time winner of that event. Davis Love III, who is also eligible to compete on the 50-and-over circuit, will also play in the JDC, in part because that tournament gave a sponsor’s exemption to his son Dru.

The Western Golf Association had planned to hold its Western Amateur championship at Exmoor this year, but the club campaigned for the senior major over two years ago and was successful. So, the Western Amateur will tee off later this month at Sunset Ridge, in Northfield, and Exmoor will serve as that tournament’s host at a later date.

Exmoor is one of Chicago’s most historic golf venues. The club was founded in 1896 and is the third oldest in Illinois behind Wheaton’s Chicago Golf Club (1893) and Lake Forest’s Onwentsia (1895). Chicago Golf Club will host the inaugural U.S. Women’s Senior Open at the same time the Constellation Senior Players Championship is in progress.

Charles Blair Macdonald, founder of Chicago Golf Club, also designed Exmoor’s original nine-hole course. Donald Ross turned it into an 18-hole course in 1915 and architect Ron Prichard completed a renovation of the course in 2003.

Forty-one of the 78 players in this week’s field were expected to check in on Monday and the rest can practice on the course on Tuesday. Gates open to the public for Wednesday’s pro-am before four days of tournament play begin on Thursday.

John Deere Classic is a throw-back to the PGA Tour from decades ago

Golf-wise, this little community on the outskirts of the Mississippi River towns of Moline and Rock Island in Illinois and Davenport and Bettendorf in Iowa is a phenomenon. A PGA Tour event has been played here every year since 2000, and the entire area known as the Quad Cities has commanded a tournament for 47 consecutive years.

The PGA Tour doesn’t seek out markets the size of the Quad Cities. It’s just too small, but the circuit is lucky to have it on its annual schedule. No community has been more supportive of the pro golf tour than the Quad Cities. As proof , note that the John Deere Classic – which tees off next week at TPC Deere Run – was the circuit’s Tournament of the Year in 2016, is a six-time winner of the Most Engaged Community award and has won the Best Social Media Activation award the last three years.

Yes, the John Deere Classic does a lot of things right. That’s what two-time winner Jordan Spieth has said. Three-time champion Steve Stricker considers the JDC a throwback to the days early in his career when community involvement was a bigger thing than it is now. That’s in part why Stricker is skipping a major on PGA Tour Champions – the Constellation Senior Players Championship, being played just two hours away in the Chicago area – to compete at TPC Deere Run.

In its early years the tournament was known as the Quad Cities Open, and eventual PGA Tour commissioner Deane Beman won the first two tournaments in 1971 and 1972 at Crow Valley, which is on the Iowa side of the Mississippi.

Crow Valley remained the site for two more years and Quad Cities was in the title until 1986, when fast-food chain Hardee’s started a nine-year run as tournament sponsor. Then it was back to the Quad City Classic for four years until Moline-based John Deere & Company, the agriculture equipment manufacturer, took over.

The tournament is expected to top $100 million in its charity giving this year, and more than 99 percent of it has come since John Deere became the sponsor. The company put its name on the tournament in 1999 — the last of the 24 years the tournament had been played at Oakwood Country Club in Coal Valley, Ill.

Oakwood was a short par-70 layout. It never played longer than 6,762 yards, the purse was but $2 million for the last playing there and the best feature was those delicious pork chop sandwiches that are still a tournament tradition.

In 2000 – the event’s 30th anniversary –the tournament was moved to 7,183-yard par-71 TPC Deere Run, a course designed by Illinois native and three-time tournament winner D.A. Weibring.

The tournament has endured some tough times, but the arrival of John Deere eventually solved most of them. The event was upgraded in a variety of ways – signage, seating, fan experiences and hospitality options — while somehow maintaining its “down home’’ feeling.

Date problems – the tournament has been played a week before the British Open — made it difficult to land some of the top players, but Clair Peterson – the tournament director since 2003 – appealed to their sense of loyalty. He made a point of using his sponsor exemptions on up-and-coming young players in hopes that they would enjoy the tournament enough to want to return when they became top stars.

In addition to Spieth among those getting those invites included Tiger Woods, Bill Haas, Jason Day, Webb Simpson, Patrick Reed, Justin Thomas and Jon Rahm. Some didn’t been back, but many did.

In 2004 the R&A gave the JDC the last British Open exemption. That helped the tourney’s credibility and Peterson took it a step further with what now seems a stroke of genius. In 2008 he began providing a charter jet to the British Open site. It’d fly directly from the Quad Cities Airport, and players and their caddies could depart a few hours after the last putt dropped at TPC Deere Run. Reduced travel expenses to the British proved a much better enticement for players to come to the JDC than any increase in prize money could.

This year the JDC may have its best field ever. Bryson DeChambeau is the defending champion. Long-time favorites Stricker and Zach Johnson (an Iowa native who is on the JDC board of directors and a tournament ambassador) are fixtures. Brandt Snedeker is returning for the first time since 2009, when he was the tourney runner-up. There’s also a nice foreign touch with Italy’s Francesco Molinari, who won the Quicken Loans National last week, and Joaquin Niemann, the 19-year old Chilean sensation.

Those sponsor exemptions will also bear watching again. All were collegiate stars with Illinois ties. Dylan Meyer and Nick Hardy played at the University of Illinois. Ben Hogan Award winner Doug Ghim grew up in the Chicago suburbs and Norman Xiong won a Western Amateur in the Chicago area.

Thirty-seven years later, and Pat Bradley tries to win another U.S. Open in Chicago

Golf was a different game when Pat Bradley won the ultimate title available to her, the U.S. Women’s Open. She did it at LaGrange Country Club in 1981, coming from three strokes behind in the last round to post a 66 and beat out Beth Daniel and Kathy Whitworth. It was the crowning achievement in Bradley’s Hall of Fame career.

“I went back 25 years later and played the course from the same yardage,’’ said Bradley. “But I found the ball and equipment had changed. I didn’t have metal woods back then. I had persimmon. In today’s world the equipment and balls are much stronger. We weren’t fitted for our clubs. If it felt good, we’d take it.’’

Bradley played her last U.S. Open at Merit Club, in Libertyville, in 2000 but she never stopped competing. Her last event on the LPGA tour was the 2004 Dinah Shore Championship, when she was 53 years old and a World Golf Hall of Famer for 13 years.

“Even that was stretching it,’’ said Bradley. “A lot of us hung on longer than we should have beause we knew that when it was over it was really over.’’

Eventually The Legends Tour was created for players who had reached their 45th birthday. That meant Bradley could compete in a few tournaments each year but it wasn’t the same as the men’s immediately popular Senior PGA Tour (now called PGA Tour Champions).

This week, though, the past merges with the present for Bradley. She’s part of the 120-player field for the inaugural U.S. Women’s Senior Open, which tees off on Thursday at Chicago Golf Club in Wheaton. The U.S. Golf Association’s newest national championship will be played on America’s first 18-hole course. There’s something special about that.

“I’ve been waiting for this Open for 17 years. I wish it was 17 years ago, but it’s here now and I’m grateful,’’ said Bradley, now 67.

There are other special things playing into Bradley’s golf career now. The rest of the golf world was slow to show respect for the players of her era, but last fall the LPGA scheduled its first event for its former stars — the Senior LPGA Championship at Indiana’s French Lick Resort. That meant the end of The Legends Championship, but a bigger and better event was put in its place.

And, what was once the LPGA Championship is now called the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship – an event played at Kemper Lakes in Kildeer two weeks ago. The PGA of America took over management of that tournament from the women’s group three years ago and made it bigger and better.

Bradley’s nephew, Keegan Bradley – every bit the fierce competitor his aunt is – won the men’s PGA Championship in 2011. That’s a source of family pride, too, but it took far too much time for the women’s game to catch up to the men’s.

The PGA has held its men’s Senior Championship since 1937 and the PGA Tour has had its senior circuit, now called PGA Tour Champions, since 1980. That same year the USGA conducted its first U.S. Senior Open for men.

PGA Tour Champions will also be playing in Chicago on the same days as the U.S. Women’s Senior Open this week. It’ll hold its Constellation Senior Players Championship at Exmoor, in Highland Park.

Schedule conflicts aside, at least the women will finally get their chance. Unlike the Senior LPGA Championship, the U.S. Women’s Senior Open is a walking-only event for those who have reached their 50th birthday. Also, unlike the LPGA, this national championship had nation-wide qualifying rounds. Entries hit 462, with this week’s field comprised of players (like Bradley) invited off past performance with those who survived the qualifiers.

The walking-only requirement has ruled out several LPGA stars of the past, most notably Nancy Lopez who has undergone knee replacement surgery. Lopez will be on hand as a starter.

Bradley, though, won’t be there for ceremonial purposes. She is serious about competing and has contacted her former swing instructor, Gail Davis, to sharpen her short game. Davis, now 81 years old, is living in Garland, Tex. She was an LPGA player in the 1960s. Bradley has also re-connected with Bob Rotella, her psychologist.

“We’re trying hard, and we’ve had a great run-up to the tournament,’’ said Bradley. “We’re very excited, and I’m thrilled to be a part of it. We’re going to make history here.’’

The favorites would seem to be Scotland’s Trish Johnson, who won the first Senior LPGA Championship; Juli Inkster, who still competes on the LPGA Tour; and England’s long-hitting Laura Davies, who needs a win to qualify for the LPGA Hall of Fame.

“This is a huge event for Laura,’’ said Bradley.

It’s also a big event for Chicago Golf Club, which has hosted 11 USGA championships. The club last opened its doors to the public for a tournament in 2005, when the Walker Cup matches were played there.

“The USGA really found a beauty for this tournament,’’ said Bradley. “This course will be fair, whether you’re a short hitter or a Laura Davies hitter.’’

The field will play 18-hole rounds on Thursday and Friday, and the low 50 including ties will play 36 more holes on the weekend to determine the first U.S. Women’s Senior Open champion.