By Greg Stewart
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Fighting Illini By Greg Stewart It was a huge day for Illinois golf on July 18, when Oquawka native Todd Hamilton triumphed at the 2004 British Open in a three-hole playoff with Ernie Els. The same day, three-time State Amateur champ D.A. Points out of Pekin notched his second Nationwide Tour victory this year to clinch his 2005 PGA Tour card. ove over, Bob Goalby. Illinois has another major But there aren’t. Chick Evans, who won both the U.S. winner. Open and the U.S. Amateur in 1916, was born in It’s been 36 years since Goalby was declared Indianapolis. Hinsdale resident Jeff Sluman was born in the winner of the 1968 Masters. Until July 18, Rochester, N.Y., not far from where he won the 1988 PGA Mthe Belleville native was believed to be the only Illinois-born Championship at Oak Hill. Other accomplished Tour players player to win one of golf’s four major championships. with Illinois roots—Jay Haas, D.A. Weibring, Gary Hallberg, But unlike Goalby’s win—the result of Roberto De Vicenzo David Ogrin—never have won a major. being disqualified for signing an incorrect scorecard—Todd By now, most golf fans are familiar with Todd Hamilton’s story. Hamilton stared down one of the world’s top players in a four- The international press were tripping over their computer hole playoff and emerged as the 2004 British Open champion. keyboards to tell the tale of this 38-year-old rookie from “I never even thought about that,” Hamilton says of being Nowheresville, USA who toiled in obscurity for close to 20 the only other player from the Land of Lincoln to win a major. years in faraway lands before going toe-to-toe with Ernie Els. “I figured with all the good golfers who have come out of Hamilton was the lead in the golf story of the year that Chicago, there would be more than two of us.” unfolded at Royal Troon on the weekend of July 17-18. Hamilton tees off on no. 2 at Royal Troon during the 2004 British Open. JD CUBAN/GOLF WORLD & STEPHEN SZURLEJ/GOLF JULY/ AUGUST 2004 15 ILLINOIS BOY Born in Galesburg, Hamilton was raised in Oquawka, a town of about 1,500 resi- dents on the banks of the Mississippi River in Henderson County. As unknown as Hamilton was to the world before he held off Els, he was well-known in down- state Illinois. Hamilton’s interest in golf started as a youngster at Hend-Co Hills, then a nine- hole layout where the locals said he would practice chipping and putting for hours. “They like to tell stories about how they had to chase him off the practice green when he was a kid because he was wear- ing it out,” Monmouth’s Dale Brock says of Hamilton’s persistent practice habits. “They would say, ‘Todd, give it a rest.’” Hamilton won his first tournament, the ©STAN BADZ/PGA TOUR Pepsi Little People’s Golf Championship, (Above) Hamilton blasts out of a bunker during the 2004 Bank of America Colonial. in Quincy in 1975. (Below) After his British Open triumph, Hamilton relaxes with son, Tyler, and daughter, Kaylee. Before long, his dad, Kent, would take time off from running the family busi- “That’s basically where he started play- ONE-MAN TEAM ness, Hamilton’s Super Market, to take ing competitive golf,” explains Kent Playing as an individual out of Union High him to tournaments. Hamilton. “(Former tournament director) School in Biggsville, Hamilton won the “I remember getting up at 5 a.m. so Earl Martin was very instrumental in his 1981 and `82 Illinois High School my dad could drive me to Peoria,” beginning.” Association (IHSA) Class A state golf title at Hamilton says of playing in the Peoria “He was the top player in the state of Arrowhead Country Club in Chillicothe. Park District Junior Open tournament Illinois for six years,” recalls Martin. “Nobody Union, a school of about 200 stu- series in the late 1970s. else even came close.” dents, didn’t have a golf team, so JD CUBAN/GOLF WORLD & STEPHEN SZURLEJ/GOLF 16 WWW. CDGA. ORG Hamilton hitched rides to tournaments with the team from nearby Monmouth Pointing Toward Prominence High School. Points had a bad case of the St. Louis blues on June 8. The “I was never a big fan of co-ops Nationwide Tour player missed advancing to the U.S. Open by because I was trying to help schools D.A. one shot in a sectional qualifier at Old Warson Country Club establish their own golf programs,” notes and left town sounding lower than at any point in his pro career. Bill Pieper, who retired as golf coach at “I’m pretty disappointed,” Points said as he rambled north on Interstate 55 on Monmouth in 1994. “As a favor to Kent, the way to Chicago for the LaSalle Bank Open. “I can think of 30 different ways I agreed to take (Todd) with my team.” I could have got back one shot.” The summer before his freshman year Points should thank the golf gods he never found that one shot. in college, Hamilton entered a junior Qualifying for the 2004 Open at Shinnecock Hills might have caused him to tournament in Streator. skip the Nationwide event in Glenview the week prior to the Open and certainly “The who’s-who list of past players in would have kept him out the next week in Scranton, Pa. Instead, Points this tourney is long,” remarks Don played the Nationwide schedule and put together the best two weeks of his Keeley, who grew up on Streator Country professional career. Club. “Todd shot a 61 on the first day of A second-place finish in Chicago was followed by a win in Scranton. A spon- the championship. It was the first time he sor’s exemption into the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic, where he missed the cut, had seen our golf course. His card was followed by another Nationwide win in West Virginia. At press time, Points included an ace on no. 3. His score could was the leading money winner on the Nationwide Tour with nearly $293,000 and have been lower, but he took a bogey on had clinched a PGA Tour card for the 2005 season. no. 18 for a 28-33. It’s still the lowest 9- “Everything happens for a rea- and 18-hole round ever on the course.” son,” says Points. “Looking back, not getting in the U.S. Open might SOONER YEARS be the best thing that ever hap- Hamilton’s success in the junior ranks pened to me.” earned him a scholarship to Oklahoma, A native of Pekin, Ill., Points grew where he was a three-time All-American. up near the 17th hole at Pekin He went to PGA Tour Qualifying Country Club, a member club of the School after college but met an all-too- CDGA. Before the sectional qualifier common fate in the fall of `87. A 73 in the in St. Louis, Points made an appear- final round would have earned him a ance in his hometown, where he Tour card on his first try. spoke of “finding the swagger” that “I shot 76,” Hamilton remembers. made him a three-time Illinois State “But I was all over the place. I was put- Amateur champion in the 1990s. ©CHRIS CONDON/PGA TOUR ting my eyes out just to shoot that.” Playing out of Pekin High School, In February of 1988, Hamilton took Points won the 1993 IHSA Class AA off for the Asian Tour. Regular stops in state title. After graduation, he exotic locales such as Calcutta, India; made his mark against the big boys Taipei, Taiwan; Seoul, South Korea; and by winning the ’95 Illinois State Points emerged victorious at the 2004 Bangkok, Thailand opened Hamilton’s Amateur Championship at Illini Northeast Pennsylvania Classic. eyes to the abject poverty in the Eastern Country Club in Springfield. hemisphere’s Third World nations. “The State Amateur is the biggest Illinois tournament you can win,” Points “I’ve seen a lot of strange things,” he remarks. “Winning that first one really helped me because it showed me I had the says of his 16 years overseas. “Calcutta is ability to win on another level.” a place I really don’t care to see again. But Points won again at Rend Lake in the ’97 State Amateur, but counts his third my experiences over there definitely title—the ’98 State Am at Eagle Ridge in Galena—as the crowning achievement helped me. Most of the courses we of his amateur career. played weren’t real spectacular, and you “I was really excited when I won that last one because I won it in such decisive spend a lot of time by yourself. I think it fashion,” Points recalls. really helped my patience.” A 7-under-par 65 gave Points a winning total of 280 on the North Course, eight The patience to handle intercontinen- shots better than runner-up Adam Turner. tal travel, among other things, on a regu- “I finished my Illinois amateur career playing about as well as I could.” lar basis. Hamilton would fly to Asia, stay Points turned pro that fall for the Chicago Open, advanced to the Canadian and play for six weeks or so, return home Tour and made enough money to move up to the Buy.com Tour. for a spell, then go back.