SHORT GAME Sahalee CC to host 2024 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship dates announced soon

Sahalee Country Club, which stepped up on short notice to host the 2016 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and helped enhance the status of the second oldest women’s major, has been awarded another one.

The PGA of America, which took over running the KPMG-sponsored event for the LPGA Tour in 2015, announced in December that the Sammamish club had been selected to host the event in 2024. The date for the event is still uncertain but likely will be the third week in June.

“We have an active championship committee,” says Bryan Nicholson, the club’s director of golf. “The mission statement of the club is to host significant championships.”

The tournament, originally known as the LPGA Championship, was first held in 1955 at Orchard Ridge GC in Fort Wayne, Ind., where a match play final (Bev Hanson beat Louise Suggs 4&3) followed three rounds of stroke play. Following the 2015 event, played at Westchester CC in Harrison, N.Y., and won by Inbee Park, the PGA of America elected to rotate the event throughout the country.

The announcement gave Sahalee just 11 months to prepare. In 2016, it pulled off an incredibly well-attended event that included a Women’s Leadership summit fea- turing Condoleezza Rice, and a thrilling finish as Brooke Henderson defeated Lydia Ko at the first playoff hole.

“They reached out to us, and the club threw together an unbelievable championship that year,” Nicholson says. “We got unbelievable crowds which speaks to the interest for professional golf in the Northwest as well as the power of the women’s game.”

Sahalee opened in 1969 and was designed by Ted Robinson with a renovation by Rees Jones in 1996. It has 27 holes with the North and South nines being used for the tournament. The media center, merchandising, sponsor tents and other tournament-related operations, meanwhile, will go on the East Course.

When the club hosted the 2016 Women’s Summit in the clubhouse’s ballroom with speeches by Rice (the former U.S. Secretary of State under George W. Bush) and other women’s leaders, there was concern the event would not be well attended. In fact, it was oversubscribed, and people had to be turned away. Nicholson is expecting a similarly-large gallery for the 2024 tournament which will feature 156 of the best women golfers in the world — a number that includes 20 club professionals.

Canada’s Henderson took the title seven years ago becoming the youngest ever winner of the event. The then 18-year-old birdied the first extra hole to beat Ko, a New Zealand native and 18. Then the best women golfer in the world, Ko slipped for a couple of years before regaining her form in 2022 when she recorded 14 top-10 finishes and three wins, making 19 LPGA Tour victories in all, including two majors.

Also expected to compete are the talented Korda sisters, Nelly, and Jessica. Nelly, now 24, was still burning up the junior ranks when Sahalee first hosted the event. She turned professional in 2017 and has now won eight times with one major (2021 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Atlanta Athletic Club). Jessica, 29, has six wins.

Sahalee just completed a $2.5 million bunker renovation and plans a tree removal and championship tee expansion following the KPMG.

NBC plans full coverage all four days of the tournament. Tickets are expected to go on sale this summer. The 2023 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship will be held at the Baltusrol Golf Club (N.J.) on June 22-25.