BEALLSVILLE — A storied team competition in Western Pennsylvania’s golf fabric, the 84th WPGA Four-Ball Championship will be held Monday at Nemacolin Country Club.
A 36-hole event, the Four-Ball Championship has become a staple of the WPGA’s competition schedule.
A talented field of 68 players will compete Monday in the Four-Ball format, which has teams of two players play their own ball throughout the competition, with the lower score on each hole counting towards the team’s overall mark.
Started in 1939, the first two competitions were won by L.R. Siebert and Jack Benson, shortly before the start of World War II.
John Birmingham, Jack Brand and Arnold Cutrell have all been a part of a winning team four times. PGA Tour professional Rocco Mediate was on a winning team in 1982, his only WPGA title.
Other winners include Nathan Smith, Rick Stimmel, Frank Fuhrer and Sean Knapp.
A year ago, the team of Kevin Fajt and Darin Kowalski battled unseasonably cold weather, shooting 9-under at Hannastown Golf Club to claim the title.
This year, Fajt will team up with Stimmel, who won the competition alongside Paul Ajak in 2022, and who recently placed second at the prestigious Sunnehanna Senior Amateur Championship.
Others in the field include 2025 WPGA Women’s Mid-Amateur Katie Miller Gee, who will team up with 2017 Four-Ball champion Chuck Nettles, and will tee off at 8:00 a.m. Miller Gee finished second in the event in 2018 at Kahkwa Club. Hunter Bruce and Tanner Johnson, who won the Four-Ball Championship that year, will tee off Monday at 8:30 a.m.
2023 Four-Ball champions Brody Taylor and Brendan Shaughnessy will again link up for the event, while Carnegie Mellon standout Jason Li will play alongside Ben Huber. Current Notre Dame golfer Rocco Salvitti — who recently competed in the 125th U.S. Amateur Championship — will be in a team with Tom Nettles.
College teammates at Longwood University, Hunter Swidzinski and Scott Jordan — who have each excelled in West Penn events this summer — will compete together.
Starting times and a live leaderboard for the 84th WPGA Four-Ball Championship can be found here. (GGID: 25WPGA4BALL)