PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) - The Fan Golf Show with Mike Dudurich was Live from Hannastown Golf Club Saturday morning and he was joined by Western Pennsylvania Golf Association Executive Dirctor Terry Teasdale to discuss the upcoming 119th West Penn Amateur early next week and how the weather looks like it's going to be nice early next week.
"Little warm, looks like we're going to be dry and warm for the championship next week," said Teasdale. "We've been really fortunate, we've been able to get everything in with all the rain, it has been a challenge. But, this one, this is our big one, this is our open so we're really looking forward to it. The golf course, we were over there on Thursday, in fantastic shape, we're really looking forward to it, it's going to be a good test of golf."
They discuss more about how challenging the course will be early next week at Oakmont and how the golfers are going to enjoy the challenge of it.
The field for the West Penn Amateur is always a big one, but the interest is greater whenver they are at Oakmont.
"This year we received the most number of entries we have ever had at 314," said Teasdale. "And then last year when our Open was at Oakmont we also received the most entries we had ever received in any event at 315, so we almost got that this with just amateurs able to register. It always brings a lot of people out, we had three completely full qualifying rounds and then we had another one that had about 46 in it, so with only 30 exempt players it was competitive to get in."
They talk about the success that Sean Knapp has had at the West Penn Amateur as well as the success he has on the national level as well.
Since Mike is at the Hannastown Golf Club, he discusses with Terry the stable of great golfers that they have there and the good job they do at promoting it at the Club.
This also leads them to discuss the quality crop of amateur golfers that are here in Southwestern Pennsylvania and how they seem to be set up for success for the forseeable future.
"It certainly looks that way, even with out class of Juniors that right now is the strongest that we've ever had that I can remember," said Teasdale. "We can see that in the fact that we won the Williamson Cup for the first time in 54 years in 2017 and then we successfully defended that last year and we're looking for a three peat this year when we go to Rochester in early August."
Mike and Terry discuss more about how the strong play of the Amateurs' here in Southwestern Pennsylvania can only help the strength of the game locally. They also take a look at the upcoming schedule for the WPGA over the next few months.