Golf: Mountain State Golf Classic starts Saturday

The Open Championship in St. Andrews, Scotland will garner much of the national golf attention this weekend.

Locally however, all eyes will be on an extremely popular golf tournament being played at Grandview Country Club and Glade Springs.

Now in its 43rd year, the Mountain State Golf Classic, which was originally known as the BNI Tournament for many years, will contested Saturday through Monday here in Raleigh County.

“It is a charity tournament now and this year the proceeds will go to the Raleigh General Senior Friends,” committee member Ryan Neal explained. “They volunteer and raise money for several other charities including the United Way and the Alzheimer’s Association. The good part is that everything stays local. We had a record number of sponsors last year and I think we even topped that this year. The community support is amazing.”

Long enjoyed as a reunion of old friends as wells as the competition, the field for the 2022 event is loaded with talented and successful golfers.

Six-time champion Mike Mays leads the group of returning tournament winners that includes defending champion, Davey Jude who also won back in 2014.

Dennis Vass is in the field which will mark the 40th anniversary of his win back in 1982. He will be joined by 2008 champion Alan Wharton and Landon Perry who won his title in 2017.

Shady Spring standout, and current WVU golfer, Todd Duncan leads a contingent of golfers that made a name for themselves during their high school days.

Duncan won the 2020 Mountain State Golf Classic before leading the Tigers to the Class AA state golf title later that year. Duncan also won the double-A individual title in both 2019 and 2020.

Brett Laxton won the double-A individual title in 2016 and helped Wyoming East bring home the team championship that year as well.

Michael Growe and Patrick Smith joined Laxton for the 2016 championship before leading the Warriors to a second straight title in 2017.

Chris Daniels is also in the field coming off a low medalist finish at the 103rd WV Amateur qualifier at Pipestem last week.

“I feel like this is the strongest field that we have had by far,” Neal said. “We try to keep it at 120 golfers, but it is just hard to turn people away. Right now we are at 132 and we had to cap it there. You just never know when you will have a rain delay. If you have more than a two-hour rain delay, the guys at the end are not going to finish.”

While golf is the main focus of the weekend, if a basketball game breaks out, look out for former high school standouts Tink Brown, Tommy Williams, Brent Osborne and J.T. Bradley to jump in the mix. Mr. Daniels was also a hoop star and a deep threat back in his day.

Due to some extenuating circumstances, the format this year will be a little different, but still every bit as challenging.

The tournament will start at Grandview Country Club Saturday before moving to the Cobb Course at Glade Springs Sunday.

All players in the Open division will play the white tees the first two days and the Senior division will play the gold tees.

“This year for the first time in its history, we won’t be playing three courses over three different days,” Neal said.

The final day will be back at the Cobb Course with the championship flight moving to the blue tees. The remainder of the field will be flighted and play the same tees as Sunday.

2022 Mountain State Golf Classic Tee Time and Groupings