The Savannah Golf Championship has been rescheduled for the fall, which is good news for players such as Savannah native Tim O’Neil who have entry into the Korn Ferry Tour event.
“I don’t think I have anything else more important to do than that,” O’Neal said Monday, May 4, after the Korn Ferry Tour’s announcement of the new dates of Sept. 28-Oct. 4. “I definitely will be available for those dates to play in the tournament.”
The later dates also could be good news for local golf fans who might be permitted to attend the tournament if deemed safe based on the situation and protocols at that time regarding the coronavirus pandemic.
The Korn Ferry Tour, which is owned and operated by the PGA Tour, announced additional modifications and details regarding the restart of the 2020 schedule and a fall calendar of events that will be part of a one-time, combined 2020-21 Korn Ferry Tour season.
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Included in the fall series of tournaments is the third annual Savannah Golf Championship at The Landings Club’s Deer Creek Course.
The 2020 Savannah Golf Championship, which was originally scheduled for the week of March 30-April 5, was postponed on March 17 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The event is now one of five tournaments that will make up the Korn Ferry Tour’s new fall schedule.
Tournament director Cheyenne Overby said it’s been a fluid situation but the current plan allows for spectators.
“We will not play unless it’s safe,” she said. “We’re moving forward with that notion that we’ll have fans, that we’ll carry the special events that we have as normal. But we will follow all protocols that are in place at the time of the tournament. If there are guidelines handed down by CDC, the World Health Organization, local public health officials, that’s what we’ll go by.”
Overby confirmed that O’Neal has maintained the sponsors’ exemption from Korn Ferry, a global organizational consulting firm and the tour’s title sponsor. O’Neal said he would have understood if it had not been honored because of the complications of players with conditional status and the scarcity of tournaments.
“I’m just happy I still have the exemption and I get a chance to tee it up,” said O’Neal, who hopes that spectators — particularly his children — are allowed to attend.
“They don’t know the news yet but they’ll be excited to come out and watch me play and give their dad some support,” the Savannah resident said.
Overby said that she cannot speak for other events on the Korn Ferry Tour, but the Savannah event will have a Monday qualifier with details still to come. That’s good news for Savannah native and Thunderbolt resident Mark Silvers, a professional golfer like O’Neal without status on the PGA and Korn Ferry tours.
“If anything changes with sponsors or there’s a Monday (qualifier), I will definitely be there,” Silvers said. “Nobody has any plans moving forward unless you’re on the PGA Tour or Korn Ferry Tour. All of us on the inside, looking in are waiting to hear.”
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Silvers and O’Neal have played in previous Savannah Golf Championships and know well the sports landscape in their hometown.
“It was a huge bummer for everybody in Savannah not to have that event – whether you’re playing or just want to go watch,” Silvers said. “To have it back on the schedule is definitely great for everybody.”
The restart to the 2020 Korn Ferry Tour season will begin as previously announced with the Korn Ferry Challenge on June 8-14 at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. The event will now be one of four new events in the first six weeks back to play that have been created by the Tour to make up for the cancellation or postponement of events affected by COVID-19.