FRENCH LICK, Indiana – Last year the long overdue first major championship for senior women golfers was staged on the Pete Dye Course at French Lick Resort. The second playing of the event, 15 months later, will clearly be bigger and better than the original. The inaugural staging was paired with the Donald Ross Centennial…
Tournament Reports
Illinois Open win puts Vince India in select state golf company
Unless your name is Vince India the 69th playing of the Illinois Open will likely be an easily forgettable experience. Annually the biggest tournament for Illinois residents, this year’s version was a weather nightmare. Heavy rains delayed the first and second rounds. The weather cleared for the third round, but it couldn’t start until second-round…
No reason to think Small won’t make it win No. 13 in IPGA Championship
The Illinois PGA Championship has been Mike Small’s personal playground for nearly two decades and there’s no reason to think that the 96th playing of the tournament this month at Stonewall Orchard in Grayslake should be any different. The University of Illinois men’s coach has won the IPGA title a record 12 times, his first…
Hammer’s Western Amateur win was one for the ages
This week’s Illinois Open will be hard-pressed to duplicate the drama provided in the Western Amateur, which concluded on Saturday with one of the most dramatic championship matches in the event’s 116-year history. Cole Hammer, an incoming freshman at the University of Texas, was 4-up on Alabama senior-to-be Davis Riley with eight holes to play…
Sunset Ridge is back in the tournament spotlight for first time since 1972
It’s been quite a while since Sunset Ridge had had a moment in the sun tournament-wise. The private club in Northfield hosted the Western Open in 1972. While Sunset Ridge hosted Illinois PGA stroke play events, U.S. Golf Association qualifiers and high school tournaments in subsequent years, it has been without such a high-profile event…
McCarron makes his first major title defense at Exmoor
Scott McCarron may be a battled-hardened mainstay on PGA Tour Champions, but he anticipates a unique feeling when he opens play in the Constellation Senior Players Championship at Exmoor Country Club in Highland Park. “It’ll be the first time I’ve defended a title in a major,’’ said McCarron, looking ahead to the July 12-15 tournament…
Flavin reaches Western Am Sweet 16 in his farewell to amateur golf
Patrick Flavin’s amateur career is going to end with a bang after all. He earned a coveted place in the Sweet 16 of the 116th Western Amateur on Thursday at Sunset Ridge Country Club in Northfield and his professional debut at next week’s Illinois Open looks much more promising than it did a week ago….
Ex-NU star Hannah Kim makes IWO her first professional victory
Two years ago Hannah Kim tied for third in the Phil Kosin Illinois Women’s Open. Last year she was the runner-up. So, guess what the former Northwestern standout did to climax the 24th playing of the IWO on Wednesday at Mistwood, in Romeoville? Kim, the stalwart of coach Emily Fletcher’s powerhouse Wildcat teams of the…
Singh gets his first Champions major title in a playoff
PGA Tour Champions had become a showcase for Bernhard Langer the last few years, especially at its Constellation Senior Players Championship. That’s no longer the case. At 60 Langer isn’t the dominant player he once was, and Sunday he wasn’t up to the task with another chance to win one of the circuit’s most prestigious…
Small fades, but still picks up his biggest tourney paycheck
Illinois men’s coach Mike Small, who started the day tied for fifth, was no threat for the title in Sunday’s final round of the Constellation Senior Players Championship at Exmoor, but there was a bright side. Small picked up his biggest check on either the PGA Tour or PGA Tour champions. He earned $67,200 for…