The Benjamin boys team won for the fourth time in program history — the first time since 2009
Tiger Woods and his ex-wife Elin Nordegren were among those on hand during a presentation on Tuesday as the Benjamin School golf team members received their state championship rings. The school is located in Palm Beach, Florida.
The Benjamin boys team, led by longtime coach Toby Harbeck, won for the fourth time in program history — the first time since 2009. The squad captured the Class 1A title at Mission Inn Resort and Club.
While Charlie Woods is the team’s most famous member, others on the squad include Brooks Colton, Pavel Tsar, Jake Valentine, Charlie Woods, and Tyler Bruneau.
After winning the title, Charlie Woods teamed with his dad to take fifth place at the PNC Championship in Orlando.
Greg Lovett and Emilee Smarr of the Palm Beach Post contributed to this post.
Hovland’s move gives this county half of the world’s top 10 golfers in the current ranking and 10 of the top 30.
Palm Beach County in Florida has added another top 10 golfer in the world among its residents.
Norway’s Viktor Hovland, ranked No. 4 in the Official World Golf Ranking, recently moved from Stillwater, Oklahoma, to Palm Beach Gardens, where he is living with a friend. Hovland is scouting the area for the best place to buy.
Hovland’s move gives Palm Beach County half of the world’s top 10 golfers in the current ranking and 10 of the top 30.
Hovland, 26, had lived in Stillwater since arriving at Oklahoma State University. When asked about the move after his pro-am Wednesday before the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill, he compared the weather in the Midwest to South Florida.
“The weather is a big one,” he said. “It’s just hard to beat it for golf, especially this time of year. This has kind of been a rough winter in Stillwater. Just not great for practicing. Even though I love Oklahoma. Summertime it’s great, and I certainly miss the people there.”
Stillwater’s average temperature from December through January is in the 50s. The city had three consecutive days in January when the low was below zero.
Hovland also was drawn by the proximity to international airports, especially Miami which has nonstop flights to Oslo.
“I do find it easier if I want to go back home to Norway, it’s a direct flight from Miami,” he said. “I can have family and friends come down and hang out. It’s a little bit harder for them to come to Stillwater, and, yeah, there’s not much to do there either. So at least in Florida, there’s a little bit more we can do.”
Hovland is the reigning FedEx Cup champion, which earned him $18 million, and has won six times on the PGA Tour. He joins fellow top 10 golfers Rory McIlroy (No. 2), Xander Schauffele (5), Patrick Cantlay (6) and Matthew Fitzpatrick (9) as residents of northern Palm Beach County. Hovland, McIlroy and Fitzpatrick were part of the victorious European Ryder Cup team, as were Jupiter residents Shane Lowry (54) and team captain Luke Donald.
Keegan Bradley (15), Cameron Young (21), Justin Thomas (23), Matthieu Pavon (24) and Brooks Koepka (30) round out top 30 county residents in the current ranking.
Others of note include Rickie Fowler, Daniel Berger, Gary Woodland, Eric Cole, Lucas Glover and Matt Kuchar.
Koepka leads a long list of LIV golfers in the area, among them Branden Grace, Dustin Johnson, Anirban Lahiri, Joaquin Niemann, Mito Pereira, Charl Schwartzel, Peter Uihlein and Matthew Wolff.
Bernhard Langer, Ernie Els and Justin Leonard are among those on the PGA Tour Champions living in the county.
Tom D’Angelo is a senior sports columnist and golf writer for The Palm Beach Post. He can be reached at tdangelo@gannett.com.
They want a return to the world-class fields regularly seen until about five years ago.
Todd Fleming believes the Cognizant Classic in the Palm Beaches has all the ingredients to become a premier stop on the PGA Tour.
Why else would the 45-year-old leave a job as vice president for global sales at Legends, a company that specializes in solutions for sports organizations and venues?
Fleming, who spent two years as the manager of ticket sales for the Miami Heat in the 2000s, is Cognizant’s new executive director. He will take over running the event after this year’s tournament concludes.
Cognizant will be held Feb. 29-March 3 at PGA National.
“I know we will build a championship this community can take immense pride in, as well as our players,” said Fleming, who worked 14 years at Legends. “This has tremendous potential to be a marquee event on the Tour each and every year.”
Cognizant replaced Honda as the title sponsor of the event that has been held in Palm Beach Gardens the last two decades and at PGA National since 2007. Joie Chitwood, hired by the PGA Tour in May to run the 2026 Presidents Cup, was asked to step in this year on an interim basis to help the event through the transition.
The Tour’s Championship Management division will take over operations of the event.
“The PGA Tour doesn’t do the acquisitions in taking over rights and control of an event if they don’t believe in the marketplace and believe there is a real opportunity for growth,” Fleming said.
Matt Rapp, senior vice-president of the PGA Tour’s Championship Management Division, spoke about the Tour’s desire to continue the event’s growth outside the ropes started by former executive directors Ken Kennerly and Andrew George. They also want a return to the world-class fields regularly seen until about five years ago.
Todd Fleming has been named executive director of the Cognizant Classic.
With Rory McIlory and Rickie Fowler heading the early entries – and the Tour adjusting the schedule in Cognizant’s favor – this year’s tournament is off to a good start.
“The work that’s been done with this event to this point has been incredible,” Fleming said. “You got to build on that.”
While attendance, charitable contributions and the build-out continue to grow, Fleming said the goal also is to stage an event golfers are “juiced up” to play.
“When you’re on the golf course, you’re talking to guys next to you,” Fleming said about the pros. “If we get the right mixture of atmosphere, amenities, the right product and spectator enhancements these guys are going to talk to each other.”
Once that happens, then it’s up to Fleming and his team to “be revolutionary” in how they can think outside the ropes.
“Then we nailed it,” he said. “Then it’s blue sky after that. If we can get this thing going, there is no question in my mind people want to be in this marketplace.”
Eric Cole tees off at the 17th hole during the third round of the 2023 Honda Classic at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. (Photo: Andres Leiva/Palm Beach Post)
Fly on the wall for ’24 Cognizant
Fleming will be on site for this year’s tournament.
“I’ll be a fly on the wall and get as much knowledge as I can,” he said. “Shadowing and listening as much as possible. There’s still some things we have to evolve, make sure we’re putting on an event the community and Palm Beach County is proud of.”
A graduate of the University of Mount Union in Alliance, Ohio, where he was a point guard on the basketball team, Fleming has a reputation as a leader, communicator and motivator.
In 2018, he was named one of Sports Business Journal’s “Forty Under 40.” Prior to joining Legends, he worked in business operations for the Charlotte Bobcats, Dallas Cowboys, New Jersey Nets, Heat and Cleveland Cavaliers. His two-year stint in Miami started in 2004.
While at Legends, Fleming helped complete the Yankees’ $40 million renovation to Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, assisted the Chargers in their move to Los Angeles and helped a company win the right to sell premium seats for the Raiders’ new stadium in Las Vegas.
“Todd’s track record at Legends speaks for itself,” Rapp said. “His vast experience in establishing new partnerships across the sports landscape is perfect for our long-term goals in South Florida as we look to create a best-in-class tournament atmosphere catered for our top PGA Tour players, partners and fans.”
Fleming and his family will move from their current home in Austin, Texas, to Palm Beach County following the 2023-24 school year.
“We are in the perfect epicenter,” Fleming said about growing Cognizant before adding that Palm Beach County needs to be a destination for people who want to see “great golf and have an experience.
“We have an opportunity to do that. We’re going to go all in.”
The Cognizant (formerly Honda) Classic has not featured a golfer ranked among the top two in nearly a decade.
The Cognizant Classic has not featured a golfer ranked among the top two in the world in nearly a decade.
That likely will end in 2024.
Rory McIlroy, a Jupiter, Florida, resident and world No. 2, has committed to the event formerly known as the Honda Classic. McIlroy, the 2012 champion, has not played in the tournament held at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, since 2018.
“It’s always good to come back to a tournament where you’ve won and had success before, and even better when it’s a bit of a home game,” McIlroy, 34, said. “PGA National is a great test of golf and the fan support and incredible crowds make for an exciting atmosphere throughout the week for the players.”
Cognizant will be held Feb. 29-March 3.
Cognizant has not had a golfer ranked in the top 10 the week of the event in the past three years and none in the top two since McIlroy was No. 1 in the world when he played in 2015. The 2023 field included four of the top 30 golfers, none higher than 18th.
McIlroy joins fellow Jupiter resident Rickie Fowler, No. 27 in the Official World Golf Ranking, as the first two announced commitments.
Rickie Fowler (white shirt) and Rory McIlroy walk the first fairway during the final round of the CJ Cup golf tournament. (Photo: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports)
With the PGA Tour adjusting the 2024 schedule to add a week between the West Coast Swing and Cognizant, which is the start of the Florida Swing, the hope is the field receives a boost.
Cognizant signed a six-year deal as the new title sponsor last month and the PGA Tour’s Championship Management division now is running the event.
McIlroy’s ties to the area run deep. He and Tiger Woods launched TGL, a virtual golf league that will be held in Palm Beach Gardens on the campus of Palm Beach State College. The start of the league has been delayed until January 2025 after the venue’s roof collapsed in November.
McIlroy coming off Dubai win
McIlroy is coming off a victory at the Dubai Desert Classic last Sunday, an event he has won a record four times. He won twice on the PGA Tour in 18 starts last season, giving him 24 career tour victories, including four majors.
McIlroy, from Northern Ireland, led the victorious 2023 European Ryder Cup team with four victories. He won his Sunday singles match over Sam Burns, teamed with Tommy Fleetwood for two more wins and Matt Fitzpatrick for another.
McIlroy’s lone loss, in which he was teamed with Fitzpatrick, was filled with drama. McIlroy was angered when Patrick Cantlay’s caddie, Joe LaCava, overdid his celebration after Cantlay drained a long putt that ended up clinching the match. LaCava distracted McIlroy as he was lining up a potential tying putt during a chaotic scene in which the entire U.S. team was waving its caps, a reaction to the fans who had taunted Cantlay the entire day.
Then, as he was leaving the club, McIlroy was yelling and pointing at Jim “Bones” Mackay, Justin Thomas’ caddie and a close friend of LaCava’s. He had to be held back and shoved into a car by Shane Lowry. The scene went viral.
The 2012 Honda was McIlroy’s third PGA Tour win. He carded a 12-under 268 and held off a Sunday charge from Woods, who tied for second two shots behind.
The victory allowed McIlroy to rise to world No. 1 for the first time in his career. He has spent 122 weeks atop the world ranking. McIlroy has been ranked in the top three every week but one since June 2022.
Grounds and hospitality tickets are now on sale for the 2024 Cognizant Classic in The Palm Beaches.
Tom D’Angelo can be reached at tdangelo@pbpost.com. Follow him on social media @tomdangelo44.
Fowler skipped last year’s event after making 13 consecutive starts. He’s returning in 2024.
One of the PGA Tour’s most recognizable names who makes his home in Palm Beach County is returning to the Cognizant Classic.
Rickie Fowler skipped last year’s event after making 13 consecutive starts. The Jupiter, Florida, resident is returning in 2024, possibly a sign the field could see a significant upgrade.
Fowler is No. 27 in the Official World Golf rankings and coming off a year in which he had eight top 10 finishes and won the Rocket Mortgage Classic, his sixth PGA Tour victory and first in more than four years. He also was a member of the 2023 U.S. Ryder Cup team that lost to Europe in Rome.
“As one of the most exciting players on the PGA Tour, he is a tremendous addition to our field and is sure to generate a plethora of excitement for our partners and fans during tournament week,” Cognizant executive director Joie Chitwood said.
Fowler, 35, won the Cognizant in 2017 with a four-shot victory over Gary Woodland and Morgan Hoffmann. Two years later, he finished tied for second, one shot behind Keith Mitchell.
Rickie Fowler of the United States celebrates winning on the 18th green during the final round of The Honda Classic at PGA National Resort and Spa on February 26, 2017, in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. (Photo by Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images)
Cognizant, formerly known as the Honda Classic, will be held Feb. 29-March 3 at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens.
With the PGA Tour adjusting the 2024 schedule to add a week between the West Coast Swing and Cognizant, the start of the Florida Swing, the hope is the field receives a boost.
The 2023 field included four of the top 30 golfers in the world rankings at the time, its fewest in at least a decade. None in the top 10 played for the third consecutive year.
Tom D’Angelo is a sports columnist, reporter at the Palm Beach Post. He can be reached at tdangelo@pbpost.com. Follow him on social media @tomdangelo44.
Thanks to Golfweek’s Best rankings, we break out the top courses around South Florida.
Call it South Florida or be more specific and call it southeastern Florida, one thing is for certain: The area stretching south along the coast from Port St. Lucie to Miami is packed with golf courses.
But which are the best? If you’re willing to drive a bit, there are several courses in this region that appear on the Golfweek’s Best rankings of top public-access layouts in Florida. All the courses listed below are within reasonable driving distance of cities such as Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach and Jupiter.
But it’s not as easy as pulling up our state-by-state rankings, which list Florida courses that might be a full day’s drive away from South Florida (which is not to be confused with southwest Florida, such as Naples, which is considered by most Floridians to be a distinct region).
None of this is to say there aren’t plenty of other worthy public-access courses to play around South Florida. There are. These are only the layouts ranked among the very best in the whole state that happen to be in South Florida.
There is one course worth mentioning that isn’t on the best-in-state list yet, but surely will be in years to come. Architects Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner recently renovated the former West Palm Beach Golf Course into the Park, complete with 18 holes and a short, lit par-3 course. The main 18 didn’t open in time to appear on various Golfweek’s Best lists in 2023.
Included with this list is a general map of where to find all these courses. Each one on the list below is represented with a number on the map – keep scrolling to see the numbers.
Included with each course is its position in Florida on the Golfweek’s Best public-access list. For any course that appears on our other popular rankings lists, those positions are included as well.
A little background: The hundreds of members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them on 10 criteria on a points basis of 1 through 10. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings are averaged to produce all our Golfweek’s Best course rankings.
The courses on this list allow public access in some fashion, be it standard daily green fees, through a resort or by staying at an affiliated hotel. If there’s a will, there’s a tee time – no membership required.
A Florida motorist on Saturday captured video footage showing a car being flipped by a tornado on a North Palm Beach highway.
As severe weather hammered parts of Florida on Saturday, a motorist captured video footage showing a car being flipped by a tornado on a North Palm Beach highway.
The accompanying footage was captured by a woman identified as Daphne N. and shared via Twitter by Jennifer Collins, a meteorologist for CBS12.
The 6-second clip shows the car’s rear end being lifted before the entire car flips and lands back on the highway.
“This is why vehicles are not a safe place to be during a tornado warning,” Collins stated. “Lots of damage in the area. This is US-1 north of PGA Blvd.”
It was not clear if anyone in the vehicle was injured.
The storm damaged homes and toppled trees. Residents were instructed to avoid fallen power lines.
The New York Times reported that police and fire rescue crews were patrolling North Palm Beach after the tornado touched down at about 5:45 p.m.
The National Weather Service in Miami confirmed that a tornado had struck near Palm Beach Gardens.
At the time, no injuries were reported by the village of North Palm Beach.
Carroll just got done speaking with some reporters. Here are a few notes from that conversation.
The annual NFL owners meetings are currently taking place in Palm Beach, Florida. Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider are among the front office executives speaking with the media today.
Carroll just got done speaking with some reporters. Here are a few notes from that conversation.
