SunLand team earns trip to national tournament

This is one trip they won't mind taking with the boss.

This is one trip they won’t mind taking with the boss.

Three amateurs and employees at the SunLand Golf & Country Club pro shop are joining SunLand pro Tyler

Sweet at the 2009 McGladrey Team National Championship after winning a sudden-death playoff at a sectional tournament in Salem, Ore., on Aug 26.

Fred Smith, Mike Phelan and Walter Clark first took a qualifier at their home course on June 20, then teamed up with Sweet at Illahee Hills in Salem at the Pacific Northwest PGA Section Championship, a qualifier in the national McGladrey team competition.

There, 23 teams were whittled down to four in the two-net, best ball format, each team coming in at 13-under par. Teams included Sweet’s SunLand squad, plus teams led by PGA pros Tom Carey of Meriwhether National (Hillsboro, Ore.), Ryan Clemens of Pumpkin Ridge-Ghost Creek (North Plains, Ore.) and Mike Gove of Inglewood Golf Club (Kenmore).

Sweet converted a 30-foot birdie putt while Clark made par for the one-shot win.

"We thought we would do OK," Smith said. "Everybody came together at the right time."

The team is set to compete in a 41-team field Oct. 26-28 in the McGladrey Team National Championship at Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina.

The championship tourney purse total is $200,000.

Sweet likes his team’s chances.

"Teams are relying on their pros to make their birdies and pars," Sweet said. "It depends on the amateurs; who’s playing well."

Sweet will be particularly busy this October; a week before the McGladrey event, he is competing in the ESPN nationals in Las Vegas, where he took third in 2008.

The 164-player championship field competes on three of Pinehurst’s premier layouts.

The McGladrey Team Championship is a result of the partnership between The PGA of America and RSM McGladrey, the official accounting, tax and business consulting firm of The PGA of America.