There’s a rare break in the PGA Tour season this week, and that’s a good thing. The best players are tired after playing three straight weeks of FedEx Cup playoff events and they’re welcoming a rest before the big two-week stretch coming up. The climax to the playoffs, The Tour Championship at East Lake in…
Daily Herald Columns
WGA did smart thing in moving BMW tourney to Crooked Stick
In the past six years this would have been a big week in Chicago golf. During five of those years the PGA Tour made its annual stop at Cog Hill, in Lemont, for the BMW Championship, a FedEx Cup playoff event. Only in 2008 was there no event – and that was because Cog Hill’s…
Europe will have big experience edge in Ryder Cup
If Ryder Cup experience means anything the U.S. team will be in big trouble when the biennial matches come to Medinah Country Club for their 39th staging beginning Sept. 25. Europe’s 12-man squad is loaded with veterans, to say nothing of talent. The European team, which has won four of the last five Ryder Cup…
Hohenadel wants to prove IPGA title wasn’t a fluke
What a difference a year makes. Last year the biggest tournament at Medinah Country Club was the Illinois PGA Championship, which decides the best player among the state’s club professionals. Next month, of course, Medinah hosts the 39th Ryder Cup matches and the player who shocked the Chicago golf scene with his win last year…
Only Stricker is sure bet for a U.S. Ryder Cup captain’s pick
The first phase to determine who will be playing in next month’s Ryder Cup matches at Medinah is over. Point standings, accumulated over two years, determined the eight automatic berths on the U.S. team after Sunday’s PGA Championship was completed and those earning berths were Tiger Woods, Bubba Watson, Jason Dufner, Keegan Bradley, Webb Simpson,…
Small, Guthrie elevate the profile of Illini golf program
This would figure to be a big week for Mike Small, the Illinois men’s coach. He’ll make his 11th appearance in a major championship when he tees off at the Ocean Course at Kiawah Island, S.C., in the PGA Championship on Thursday. This is the last of golf’s four majors this season and the final…
Rodgers wants to add Western Amateur to his WGA titles
Four of the world’s top six amateurs will be battling for the title in the 110th Western Amateur at Exmoor Country Club in Highland Park this week. Among them is Patrick Rodgers, who won the Western Golf Association’s Junior tournament in 2011. “The Western Am and the U.S. Amateur are the two biggest in amateur…
Pearson goes for third title on more challenging course in Illinois Women’s Open
Wheaton’s Jenna Pearson can become only the second player to win the Phil Kosin Illinois Women’s Open three times when the 18th annual tournament begins today at Mistwood in Romeoville. “I’m definitely hoping to be in that category,’’ said Pearson, who plays on the LPGA’s Symetra (formerly Futures) Tour. She captured the IWO as an…
U.S. WOMEN’S OPEN: Pak’s win in ’98 triggered big changes for LPGA
KOHLER, Wis. – Blackwolf Run was where women’s golf took a dramatic turn back in 1998. That’s where Se Ri Pak, a South Korean player, captured one of the most dramatic U.S. Women’s Opens ever. Her win in the biggest tournament in women’s golf triggered a huge influx of players from her country onto the…
U.S. WOMEN’S OPEN: Neff, Armstrong get into starting field
The 67th U.S. Women’s Open, which tees of Thursday at Blackwolf Run, in Kohler, Wis., has two late qualifiers with Chicago connections. Aimee Neff, winner of the Illinois Women’s Open in 2008 and 2009, and amateur Ashley Armstrong, a Notre Dame sophomore-to-be who won the 2011 Western Junior title, were promoted to the starting field…