St. Louis' Best Honored at Old Warson Country Club
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Updated: Fri 11/5/2010 9:46 am
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St. Louis' top golfers were honored on Thursday Night at the 17th Metropolitan Amateur Golf Association Player of the Year Awards Dinner at Old Warson Country Club. Just over 50 of the area's top golfers and golf leaders were in attendance to watch Scott Langley, Ellen Port, Scott Edwards and Barbara Berkmeyer (accepted by her son Skip) receive their recognition for earning Player of the Year in their respective categories.
Tom O'Toole Jr., recently named a Vice President of the United States Golf Association, addressed the audience with opening remarks. Over the last twenty years, O'Toole has advanced through the United States Golf Association and for the past several years has served on the USGA Executive Committee. O'Toole returned at the end of the evening to announce the promotion of Curt Rohe to the position of Executive Director of the Metropolitan Amateur Golf Association. Rohe has served as the Association's top administrator under O'Toole for most of the past decade, managing the day to day operation and tournament administration.
As O'Toole eloquently stated at the beginning of the evening, the intent of the evening was to celebrate and recognize outstanding accomplishments on the golf course and outstanding is definitely a description applicable to each of the four Player of the Year recipients. Most notabable of the Player of the Year recipients was the University of the Illinois senior, Scott Langley. Langley, coming off his participation last week in the USGA World Amateur Team Championship in Argentina, was in attendance to accept his award.
Langley's participation in Metropolitan Amateur Golf Association events goes back to his junior golf days when Langley represented the Association on the Mid-America Junior Cup Team. "It's one of my most memorable moments of the cup matches," said Rohe. "Scott hit a shot from about 100 yards to a foot to essentially clinch the matches for us under extreme pressure." His play under extreme pressure in 2010 earned him the top spot among St. Louis' amateur golfers, a position held by Skip Berkmeyer for most of the past decade.
During the presentation awarding Langley the Player of the Year trophy, Rohe pointed out that Berkmeyer's 3,400 plus points represented the most points he had ever earned. Unfortunately for Berkmeyer, 2010 was the year of Langley as the Parkway South graduate finished T16 at the U.S. Open, advanced to the quarterfinals of the U.S. Amateur, won the NCAA Individual Title and edged Berkmeyer himself in the Metropolitan Match Play Championship to being the 2010 St. Louis amateur season. During Langley's acceptance speech, he acknowledged the play of Berkmeyer in 2010, "I think we should all give Skip a round of applause for his season this year. Skip's a legend around here and I knew when we were paired against each other at Old Warson a few months ago it was going to be a tough match."
While he still has a year of amateur golf left to play, hoping to make the 2011 Walker Cup Team which will be captained by St. Louisan Jim Holtgrieve, Langley acknowledged a new chapter he was prepared and about to enter, "As I enter a new chapter in life next year and turn professional, I'll never forget this Association and what this has meant to me. While I may live somewhere else, St. Louis will always be where I got started and I thank you all." Having represented the United States of America in this year's Palmer Cup and USGA Amateur Team Championship, it's expected that Captain Holtgrieve will be selecting Langley to join him on the 2011 Walker Cup Team. If that were to be the case, Langley would most likely turn professional immediately after the Walker Cup matches next fall.
