As iconic Ohio golf course closes long PGA Tour chapter, emotions run high

For the first time in my life, I wore waterproof mascara to a golf tournament.

Not because of the heat, but because of the tears.

Sunday, July 12, was the conclusion of the Kaulig Companies Championship, ending Firestone Country Club’s 72-year affiliation with the PGA Tour. Many associated with the event saw its doom coming for months but still prayed for a miracle. Dave Shedloski of Golf Digest reported on July 8 that Kaulig Companies declined to extend its sponsorship two years ago.

Yet during Zach Johnson’s victory celebration, tournament officials declined to bid farewell to Akron. David Utlak, the event’s interim executive director, said they wanted to celebrate 2026, thank the sponsors and volunteers, and were trying to remain positive.

The uncertainty of the week certainly made PGA Tour Champions players, their spouses and longtime volunteers willing to reminisce.

Glenda Buchanan of Green spent 32 years with the golf tournament, serving as administrator of Northern Ohio Golf Charities from 2001-2017 and bookending that job with 15 years as a volunteer, including the last nine. Buchanan was among those who felt the event’s impending departure, but hoped someone would save it.

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“It’s just so sad that the tournament’s leaving,” Buchanan said.

That was the universal sentiment as the Champions Tour major moves to Newport Beach (California) Country Club in 2027.

But, like Buchanan, all found happy memories. Close, lasting friendships formed at Firestone. One blind date 26 years ago that resulted in marriage. Connections with nonprofits that relied heavily on grants provided through the tournament — $8 million raised for charity in four years, Kaulig Companies president and CEO Tim Clepper said. Dinners at Ken Stewart’s, Bakers, Vaccaro’s Trattoria and the Diamond Grille — “They used to take your address and send you a bill, which is hilarious,” Rocco Mediate said. Brushes with glory in many forms.

“The neatest thing was having the Larry O’Brien trophy sitting on my desk. That was definitely cool,” Buchanan said of the NBA championship trophy won by the Cavs in June 2016. “The guy came in wearing gloves and everything. There was a guard with it. We all had our picture taken. Then they had it out at the tournament and people could get their picture taken with it.”

Two-time Kaulig champion Jerry Kelly, who played his first World Golf Championships-NEC Invitational at Firestone in 2003, recalled one of his “welcome to the tour” moments in Akron.

“Frank Chirkinian, Verne Lundquist … those two are huge names for me. I liked to ask them where to eat,” Kelly said of late World Golf Hall of Famer Chirkinian, a producer-director, and Lundquist, two legends at CBS Sports. “They’re at that back table in the Diamond Grille, which is actually the front table because we always go in the back door. I come over and they treat me like I’m one of the crew. I still get chills thinking about it. I really enjoyed that moment with all those big guys.

“I was starstruck. Always hit the Diamond Grille ever since.”

That same year brought a special moment for Ben Curtis and Candace Beatty, former Kent State University golfers. Unknown Curtis stunned the world with his victory in the Open Championship at Royal St. George’s on July 20. He had no idea he would qualify for the NEC Invitational a month later. The rare opportunity forced them to push back the start of their wedding after he played Saturday at Firestone.

Curtis finished his third round at 3:29 p.m. Three hours later, he got married at the United Methodist Church of Kent and rode away with “Fore Love” on the windows of the limo.

That wasn’t the only touching love story involving Firestone.

In 2003, Stuart Appleby arrived in Akron after marrying Canton’s Ashley Saleet the previous December. Their matchmaker was the late Guido Ianni, a North Canton retiree who traveled the PGA Tour selling golf equipment. Ianni’s wife, Janet, worked with Saleet’s mother, Marilyn, for 10 years at Altman Hospital, and Guido thought Stuart and Ashley would make a good pair. So he set them up on a blind date during the 2000 tournament.

At the end of Appleby’s round, his caddie, Joe Damiano, gave Ashley a golf ball with an apple on it to have Stuart sign. Knowing nothing about golf, she thought the practice was weird, but went to her alma mater Mount Union to buy one so they could exchange them.

“To this day, it’s on our shelf in our office at home,” Ashley said.

Thinking back on that time and what could be the last PGA Tour event at Firestone, Stuart practically teared up.

“Meeting her here, I didn’t know it was going to be a big deal. It felt pretty cool at the time,” he said. “If I fast forward 26 years, it was probably the most memorable thing that happened. I’m a bit emotional thinking we’re never going to be here again. I like this place. Great golf course, the people are fantastic. I don’t think I’ve played a golf course more than this, out of the two tours. I would love to think there’s a way for us to get back here. It truly has a special place in my heart.

“I’ll never forget Guido, his old, old clubs. His interaction with me, his knowing Ashley, ‘You guys should hook up.’ When I met her, I was just like, ‘Wow, I’ve got to get this girl’s phone number, we’ve got to talk.’ I never played well at this place. I think I finished second once, me and Lee Westwood behind Vijay [Singh, in 2008]. But I’ll never ever forget this place, ever.”

Ryan Armour, 50, an Akron native and Silver Lake resident who attended Walsh Jesuit High School and Ohio State, starting begging his father to drop him off at the course in grade school. Corey Pavin gave Armour a bunker lesson when he was in the fourth or fifth grade. Armour saw Fulton Allem win the NEC World Series of Golf in 1993, giving the South African a much-needed 10-year exemption. Armour, a good friend of Craig Stadler’s son, watched “The Walrus” win in 1992.

“I loved Tuesday and Wednesday more than I loved the competition because I liked watching what the pros were working on,” said Armour, who earned his PGA Tour card in 2007. “I wanted to become better. I used it as a chance to learn more so than a chance to be entertained.”

When Armour finished his fourth Kaulig round, he applauded the gallery, then patted his heart.

There were plenty of personal stories when the PGA Tour Champions arrived in Akron in 2019.

In 2022, Kelly and his wife, Carol, shared details of her battle with kidney cancer. In July 2022, Steve Stricker talked of his frightening health crisis in October 2021 that kept him away from the game for six months as Stricker’s wife, Nicki, said, “We were pretty close to losing him.” In 2024, John Senden opened up about playing with Parkinson’s disease. In 2021, Kirk Triplett explained what inspired his social justice activism.

But as the curtain closes on 72 years of Firestone golf, what I remember most will be what history remembers most — Tiger Woods.

Woods recorded eight victories here — in 1999-2001, 2005-07, 2009, and 2013 — tying his personal best at one course with the eight he captured in the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill. Akron witnessed many of the biggest moments of Woods’ career.

“The Shot in the Dark,” which I didn’t see (did anyone?) in the 2000 NEC Invitational because I was furiously writing on deadline and sent then-ABJ staffer Michael Weinreb to the 18th hole.

Woods’ epic seven-hole playoff victory over Jim Furyk in 2001 when Furyk missed on birdie attempts of 12, 10 and 10 feet. The two-hour playoff was the longest on the PGA Tour in 10 years. 

Woods hitting the ball over the clubhouse with his approach at No. 9 (his final hole) in 2006, which landed in the golf cart of chef Joshua Stuber, who was unloading crunchy cream pies. Woods was given a drop between the first tee and the driving range, where I scurried, while fellow staffer Tom Reed interviewed Stuber and night switchboard receptionist Matt Varca, who was taking phone calls from all over the country during the search for Woods’ ball.

Woods’ playing partner, Jason Gore, said he was told in the scoring trailer that the 32 minutes of chaos was the longest ruling in the history of the PGA Tour.

During Woods’ last appearance at Firestone in the 2018 Bridgestone Invitational, I asked Woods nearly every day if he would return to Akron to play the Champions Tour event. Every time, he said yes. He’s now 50. That adds to the disappointment that this may be the end. Through Woods’ car accidents and 14 known surgeries in the eight years since, there was always hope that Woods might come back to his personal playground, even if he needed a cart.

“I’d like to thank Tiger Woods for not playing,” Johnson joked during the celebration on the 18th green.

Tiger tales were the first things Kenny Perry thought of on Friday, July 10, 35 years removed from his first appearance in Akron.

“I’ve been in final groups with Tiger. He did the finger point on 16, he was running after it when he won, I was in that last group with him,” Perry said. “I remember the roof shot.”

Joyce Lagios of Fairlawn, the former vice president of marketing at WAKR radio who is in her 49th year as a volunteer, remembered when she served on the tournament’s board of trustees for one of Woods’ early victories. All wore jackets and stood in a line behind the trophy presentation. After the ceremony, Woods stayed back to gaze at the yellow Wedgewood Jasperware piece that would become a collection and Lagios approached to congratulate him. He thanked her, and a photographer nearby caught the moment.

“It looked like I was giving him the trophy,” Lagios said. “[The photographer] said, ‘I got the shot. It was my last frame. I will send it to you.’ I never got it.”

Add that memory to similar ones we all treasure. Now we can only look back at Woods’ wonders on YouTube and sigh.

As one golf insider told me last month, “When the PGA Tour leaves, it doesn’t come back.” Perhaps that’s why World Golf Hall of Famer Ernie Els called the decision to abandon Akron “crushing.”

The failure to give Firestone a fitting farewell on the 18th green Sunday felt like a travesty, disrespectful of its history. But that silence and lack of finality also provided a smidgen of hope. So, too, did Els when he said he would work “behind the scenes” to bring some kind of professional golf event back to Akron.

A longtime volunteer said there was speculation about Firestone hosting an LPGA tournament in 2028.

Akron Mayor Shammas Malik attended Johnson’s trophy presentation and said he thought Johnson might join Els in his support for the city.

“It’s cool to have a champion who has such an affinity for the course,” Malik said. “He told me he’d been to Diamond Grille twice and how much he loves this community. I think that pull will keep professional golf coming back in one form or another. What that is remains to be seen.

“I don’t this this is going to be the end. I think it’s just the end of one chapter and the beginning of the next chapter.”

Nancy Bird, a Tallmadge resident serving as tournament chairperson in her 25th year as a volunteer, called 2026 “a little bit bittersweet.” But her message to marshals and volunteers was, “It’s not goodbye, it’s until we meet again.”

One of America’s most storied courses needs a tournament sponsor. Cleveland’s most respected professional team owner, Cavaliers chairman Dan Gilbert, is ending his title sponsorship of the PGA Tour’s Rocket Classic in Detroit next month after an eight-year run.

Is Gilbert getting out of the golf business? If so, where are you Sherwin-Williams? Progressive insurance? Jimmy and Dee Haslam? LeBron James? Taylor and Travis?

I left Firestone with my mascara intact. My eyes watered only when I approached Johnson to thank him for his help over the years and he said, “Good to see you.”

Johnson, like me, was not ready to say we’ve set foot on the hallowed course on Warner Road for the last time.

The Akron Beacon Journal sports department can be contacted via email at bjsports@thebeaconjournal.com. 

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: As iconic Ohio golf course closes long PGA Tour chapter, emotions run high