No Chicago-born and raised golfer has accomplished more than Gary Hallberg, and now he’s coming back. Hallberg was a state high school champion at Barrington, an Illinois Open winner twice, an NCAA champion at Wake Forest and the first player to earn PGA Tour playing privileges without going to qualifying school. As a professional he…
Daily Herald Columns
Chicago 10 must travel to find a U.S. Open sectional this year
Chicago’s two local qualifying tournaments for the U.S. Open are over. Now comes the hard part for the 10 golfers who survived. They were the lucky ones among the 180 who entered the 18-hole eliminations at Northmoor, in Highland Park, and Seven Bridges, in Woodridge, the last two weeks. Next up is the U.S. Golf…
Martin’s Fox Run, Arrowhead renovations are unveiled
April storms created a nightmare for Chicago’s golf course operators, but they were especially troublesome at Fox Run, the Elk Grove Park District facility. Fox Run has undergone a $2 million renovation for two years under the supervision of Aurora architect Greg Martin. He started on the front nine in 2011 and completed the back…
Celebrity pro-am will make new Champions Tour event special
Tampa’s loss is Chicago’s gain. The Champions Tour is preparing for its return to Chicago after an 11-year absence, and the new version will be much different than the 12 tournaments played here from 1991-2002. The Encompass Championship will be top-heavy in pro-ams when it takes over North Shore Country Club in Glenview from June…
Affrunti’s finally playing again after shoulder rehab
Finally there’s some good news involving Joe Affrunti, the Crystal Lake golfer who suffered a serious shoulder injury months after earning his PGA Tour card. Affrunti earned the right to play on golf’s premier circuit by finishing in the top 25 on the Web.com Tour money list in 2010. In June of 2011, however, he…
LPGA schedule is finally working in Jeray’s favor
Berwyn golfer Nicole Jeray spent most of the winter in Augusta, Ga., and she had a pass to get into last week’s spectacular Masters tournament there. The Chicago area’s lone member of the Ladies PGA Tour, however, had more important things to do. “I could have gotten in off my LPGA pass, ‘’ said Jeray….
Donald has “special short game shot” ready for the Masters
Last year Luke Donald was the world’s No. 1-ranked golfer entering all four of the sport’s major championships. He was No. 1 for 55 weeks, and it was at the 2012 Masters that his duel for the top spot with Rory McIlroy started. This year’s Masters begins Thursday at Augusta National Golf Club and Donald…
Streelman looks for a better result in his second Masters
Kevin Streelman may be the best feel-good story in golf these days, and maybe in all of sports. Last month Streelman, who grew up in Winfield and built his golf game playing and working at both Cantigny and Arrowhead public courses in Wheaton, won the PGA Tour’s Tampa Bay Championship. That got him into next…
Malm is the player to watch in IPGA’s last major at Eagle Ridge
It’ll be nothing like the just-completed Ryder Cup, but there is one big competitive event left in the Chicago golf season. The Illinois PGA will stage the last of its four major tournaments, the IPGA Players Championship, at Eagle Ridge in Galena on Monday and Tuesday. The section’s player-of-the-year and assistant player-of-the-year awards will be…
Tour Championship will set the stage for the Ryder Cup
Get ready, get set….. The golf season is reaching a climax, with The Tour Championship concluding the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup playoffs this week and the 39th Ryder Cup coming the following week to Medinah Country Club. Medinah, though, will open its gates to the public on Saturday. There won’t be any PGA Tour players…