Bethpage Black will be the epicenter of professional golf next week when it hosts the 45th Ryder Cup.
It won’t be the first golf tournament contested at the historic Farmingdale, New York, public facility, which was originally designed by A.W. Tillinghast and Joseph H. Burbeck, nor will it be the last. The PGA of America announced Wednesday that the 2028 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and 2033 PGA Championship will be contested on the Black Course.
Those events will continue a rich history of competition, which also includes:
2019 PGA Championship
Brooks Koepka captured his second straight PGA Championship on the Black Course, defeating Dustin Johnson by two shots in a tournament that was much more lopsided than the final score. Koepka led by seven shots after 54 holes but bogeyed five of his last eight holes. During this PGA, Koepka fired a first-round, 7-under 63 to break Rick Hartmann’s competitive course record of 65, recorded during the 2001 Met Open.
U.S. Opens
Bethpage Black hosted both the 2002 U.S. Open, won by Tiger Woods by three shots over Phil Mickelson, and the 2009 U.S. Open, in which Lucas Glover won his first and still only major title by two shots over Mickelson, David Duval and Ricky Barnes. When the Black Course welcomed the 2002 U.S. Open, it marked the first time that the championship was contested on a true public golf course, earning that U.S. Open the moniker of the “People’s Open.”
PGA Tour events
The Barclays, the former name of the first FedExCup playoff event, was played at Bethpage in 2012 and 2016, with Nick Watney and Patrick Reed winning, respectively. Sergio Garcia, in 2012, and Rickie Fowler, in 2016, both lost 54-hole leads after shooting 75 and 74, respectively. Unlike the majors at Bethpage Black, The Barclays played the layout as a par 71, not 70.
New York State Opens
While Glen Oaks Country Club took over for Bethpage this year because of the Ryder Cup, the Black Course has hosted every New York State Open since 1996 – and 31 total since the event’s inception in 1978. Winners of the New York State Open at Bethpage Black include Rob Labritz (three), Danny Ballin (three), P.J. Cowan (three), Andrew Svoboda (two), Michael Miller (two), James Nicholas (2020) and Cameron Young, who won as an amateur in 2017, the first amateur to ever do so.
Metropolitan Golf Association events
Bethpage Black is one of 18 clubs to have hosted all three Metropolitan Golf Association majors – the Met Open, Met Amateur and Ike Stroke Play Championship.
Four Met Opens have been played on the Black Course – 1989, won by Bobby Heins over George Zahringer; 2001, won by Johnson Wagner over Hartmann; 2010, won by Bob Rittberger over Danny Ballin; and 2022, won by Ryan Siegler over Max Greyserman, David Pastore, Tom Lovelady and Michael Graboyes.
The first Ike, a tournament founded by Daily News sportswriter Dana Mozley and named after President Dwight Eisenhower, was played in 1953 at Bethpage. It has traditionally awarded team and individual titles, with the first edition crowning both private and public champions, George Berggren and Bob Wilki. The Ike returned to Bethpage in 1994, when Edward Gibstein beat Jerry Courville Jr.
Jack Wall beat Luke Sample in the Met Amateur final at Bethpage in 2020.
It also hosted the 2011 Carey Cup, which matches amateurs from the Golfing Union of Ireland against those from the MGA. The home side won that event, 7.5-4.5.
And eight MGA Public Links Championships have been played on the Black Course. Bethpage Red got into the action in 2023, while the Red and Yellow courses have also served as venues for the MGA/WMGA Women’s Public Links Championship.
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