Mesa Verde reaching far corners

Bryce Alderton

The golfing world’s spotlight shines brightest on Whistling Straits

in Haven, Wis., for the PGA Championship and Mesa Verde Country Club

head golf professional Tom Sargent is right there, working, so to

speak.

He won’t be playing golf. That comes Wednesday, when the golfing

beam, at least in Newport-Mesa, will illuminate Newport Beach Country

Club for the revamped Jones Cup.

Sargent, director for PGA sections in Southern and Northern

California, along with Hawaii, will team with Mesa Verde Country

Club’s best -- Akemi Khaiat (women’s club champion), Steve Rhorer

(senior club champion) and Dave Irwin (men’s club champion) to battle

foursomes from the three other private clubs in the area (Newport

Beach Country Club, Santa Ana Country Club and Big Canyon Country

Club) at 1 p.m. Wednesday.

Today, Sargent watches the show and Wednesday he will be part of

the spectacle.

Among Sargent’s duties at the PGA Championship include announcing

players names as they tee off on Nos. 1 and 10 and as they complete

rounds on both the ninth and 18th holes. Sargent will also escort

golfers from the course to the media center after their rounds.

In addition to handling his duties at the PGA, Sargent, the PGA

National Golf Professional of the Year in 1997, also escaped to a

nearby course in Kohler to hone his game for next week’s

championship.

Back pain has limited Sargent’s rounds in recent years, but he

said he felt fine after his latest one and looks forward to

Wednesday.

“If my back holds up, I will be ready,” said Sargent, who has

taught more than 30 junior All-Americans. “My back isn’t bothering me

as much, but it is still bothersome.”

Sargent said he has played “a little bit more this year” leading

into the new Jones Cup, a product of the best of the former men’s

Jones Cup and the ladies’ Tea Cup Classic. The former Jones Cup,

which began in 2000, featured a better ball of partners format

between, presumably, the men’s club champion and a golf staff

professional from each of the four clubs.

The Tea Cup Classic, which ran its course after seven years, was

an 18-hole, stroke-play format featuring the four ladies club

champions against one another. Santa Ana Country Club’s Marianne

Towersey won five of the seven Tea Cup Classic titles.

The melding of the two combines successful players from each club.

Mesa Verde’s team has its share of experience in the former Jones Cup

-- Sargent played in all four while Rhorer competed in 2003 -- and

Tea Cup Classic -- Khaiat played in the last two events, including

finishing second by two strokes to Towersey in last year’s event.

Khaiat, born in Tokyo, has claimed the last three Mesa Verde

Country Club women’s titles and was a co-captain on the Japanese

national team in 1998 when it competed in the World Amateur

championship in Santiago, Chile.

Rhorer not only tasted his share of golf on an international scale

in April’s senior masters at the Golf Resort at Indian Wells, but

emerged victorious.

Rhorer shot 6-under-par (74-74-66-68 -- 282) to win by one stroke

over Texan Joe Cadale in the invitational that included golfers ages

55 and older from Taiwan and Canada. Rhorer led by three strokes with

three holes left in the final round, but Cadale birdied Nos. 17 and

18 to put the heat on. Rhorer remained stable and parred both holes

for the victory.

“It’s probably my biggest win,” said Rhorer, who also won his

second Mesa Verde Country Club senior title in the spring.

Irwin’s victory in the men’s club championship last August

qualified him for this year’s Jones Cup and also moved him into a

trio of select company in Mesa Verde Country Club lore. Irwin joined

Rhorer and Pete Daley as the only golfers to win both men’s and

senior club titles at Mesa Verde Country Club in the same year.

Daley, with four men’s club titles, including four straight from

1998-2001, ranks second to Clyde Sarver’s five since the club opened

in 1959.

As of Wednesday, Mesa Verde hadn’t chosen a team color. When asked

earlier in the week, Sargent, who returns Monday, quipped, “Maybe

something like fuchsia.”

Fuchsia somewhat resembles red, which has signified scores for

Mesa Verde team members lately.