BATON ROUGE — Three former LSU men’s golf standouts are set to tee it up this weekend at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Okla., as 156 of the game’s best players have gathered to compete in the 89th PGA Championship beginning Thursday.
Phil Schmitt ? the PGA Head Professional at The Bluffs Country Club in St. Francisville ? will join PGA Tour Professionals Brian Bateman of Monroe and David Toms of Shreveport in the chase for “Glory’s Last Shot” after the trio played a practice round together on Tuesday.
Schmitt, who is making his first career appearance in a major championship, earned his spot in the PGA Tour’s last major of the 2007 season with a top-20 finish at the 2007 PGA Professional National Championship in Sunriver, Ore., on June 24. He tied for ninth place in a field featuring 312 PGA Professionals from across the country.
Bateman received an exemption into this year’s PGA Championship with his first career PGA Tour victory at the Buick Open on July 1, which also earned him an exemption to compete in the 2008 Masters Tournament in April. This is his second career start in a major championship.
Toms won the only major championship of his career at the 2001 PGA Championship when he outlasted PGA Tour great Phil Mickelson for the title at the Atlanta Athletic Club in Duluth, Ga. This win gave the former three-time All-American a lifetime exemption to compete in the event.
Toms has already earned a pair of top-10 finishes in major championships this season as he finished in ninth place at The Masters in April followed by a fifth-place effort at the U.S. Open Championship in July. He is the most successful Tiger in tour history as he has 12 career victories and is ranked No. 7 on the all-time money list with $27,805,842 in career earnings.
Schmitt is scheduled to tee off on the first hole at 7:40 a.m. CDT with Toms following off the front nine at 1:50 p.m., while Bateman is slated to start from the back nine beginning at 7:35 a.m. Bateman will then tee off from the front nine on Friday at 12:40 p.m. with Toms and Schmitt starting from the back nine at 8:45 a.m. and 12:55 p.m., respectively.