No tournaments, but NYSGA still keeping busy
A season without tournaments to run — and few do it any better — hasn’t left the New York State Golf Association with nothing to do this summer.
The NYSGA is exploring ways to help existing tournaments throughout the state operate more efficiently, lending its expertise and staff to help with registration, scoring and other areas that can improve efficiency.
In addition, something introduced in this column last year, the association wants to administer an amateur tournament in the Capital Region.
That could be as early as August or September of this year.
“It’s going to happen,” NYSGA assistant executive director Andrew Hickey said. “I’ve given it some lip service in the past, but we’re going pretty strongly right now.”
The association staff, including its interns, is busy trying to identify existing tournaments it can help.
“Next week we’re starting on the Adirondacks and Albany,” Hickey said. “We’ll be fact-finding them. We have some information on them already. Once we get all that in place, we’re going to start reaching out to players in these regions and learning more about what they would want to see in tournaments in their region.”
Even without the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced over time the NYSGA to cancel its entire championship and Amateur Series
schedules, this area has lacked quality individual tournaments. That may help explain why there hasn’t been a State Amateur winner here since 1986.
The pandemic has further exposed that shortcoming. The Troy Invitational was able to conduct its tournament in mid-june, and the Capital Stroke Play remains firm on its Aug. 1-2 dates at Schuyler Meadows.
Two events postponed from early in the season, the Tri-county Match Play at Colonie and the Schenectady Classic at Schenectady Municipal, are still hoping to reschedule in the late summer or the fall.
That’s about it other than the state events, which in non-pandemic years have one-day qualifiers in the area. So why not add to the schedule?
“If we do this the right way,” Hickey said, “we should be able to get their support to host these events and be a little bit more creative in our formats and our schedule to see what attracts the 21st century tournament golfer.
“Right now we’re in the research phase, trying to compile all the tournaments in each region, trying to figure out what tournaments are needed, which we might be able to help support that fit our model. By support, I mean online registration, online scoring, making their tournaments look like our tournaments in the way that they have websites. It’s a more 21st century look and feel.”
More from the NYSGA
In other NYSGA news, clubs that were scheduled to have 2020 championships — the Senior Women’s was set for late next month at Pinehaven — will be consulted about returning to the 2021 schedule.
The 2021 Men’s Amateur and Men’s Mid-amateur already had been announced for Capital Region courses (Schuyler Meadows and Shaker Ridge, respectively), but those are on hold.
“We’re working with all of our 2020 host sites to hopefully reschedule in 2021,” Hickey said. “Tournaments that we already have sites selected for 2021, we’re going to be contacting them and our 2020 hosts and find out what works best for both courses. We want to try to maintain our 2020 relationships with these facilities, but we also want to make sure we push aside other championships at clubs.”
Club roundup
■ Battenkill: Scott Daigle snared his 10th men’s club championship. Dani Degregory won her first women’s title.
■ Capital Hills: A two-person invitational is planned for Sunday, Aug. 9. There are scratch, handicap and senior divisions. Registration will be taken care of in the pro shop.
■ Cobleskill: The third annual Schoharie Open is scheduled for Aug. 8.
■ Pinehaven: Steve Bass captured the men’s senior club championship. Nadine Toma was the women’s winner.
■ Saratoga Lake: The Big Hole tournament Aug. 1 has sold out, but the club plans another at season’s end.
■ Troy: The holes-in-one list in this space last week mentioned that Jim Kelley had his fourth career ace, but the rest of the story is that all have come this year. Kelley scored his first in January in Florida, then aced No. 15 at Troy twice 41 days apart before registering No. 4 at the 12th.
■ Van Patten: Ed Kinley and Tige White won the two-person crown.
Elsewhere
The 53rd PGA Professional Championship, postponed from April and rescheduled for next week in Austin, Texas, has been canceled because of COVID-19 concerns. Scott Berliner of Saratoga Spa and Eric Mabee of Pittsfield were qualified to represent the Northeastern New York PGA.