Michigan Golf Journal April 2020

Symetra Tour Celebrates 40th Anniversary in 2020 Throughout the 2020 season, once it resumes, the Symetra Tour will celebrate its 40th anniversary. Michigan has hosted seven different Symetra tournaments since the first in 1984, the one-time Candlestone Classic outside Grand Rapids. From 1997-200, three metro Detroit courses hosted a tournament – Cattails Golf Club in South Lyon, Washtenaw CC in Ypsilanti and Mystic Creek GC in Milford.  For parts of 2000-to-2005, both Grand Rapids and Ann Arbor hosted again. The Island Resort Championship at Sweetgrass in the U.P. began in 2011 and still runs today, as does the FireKeepers Casino tournament in Battle Creek, since 2014. Tullymore also hosted for three years (2015-17). In 2019 the Symetra Tour eclipsed the $4 million threshold in total prize money for the first time in Tour history. An average purse size of $180,000 this season is the highest mark in the 40-year history of the Tour, up from $121,000 in 2015.   MGJ Lawton’s Michael Garvey has given nearly 40 years of service to teaching, coaching and administration in educational athletics, and was named the 2020 recipient of the Michigan High School Athletic Association’s Charles E. Forsythe Award. Garvey, who grew up mostly in Detroit, began his educational career in 1980 teaching at Marian Central Catholic in Woodstock, Ill., before returning to Michigan in 1985 to teach at Lawton High School. While at Lawton, he helped the Blue Devils’ wrestling program as an assistant coach, then head coach, for five Class D state championships, in the 80’s and 1990. He also served as athletic director at four schools over his career – at Lawton, Delton Kellogg, Otsego and Kalamazoo Hackett Catholic Prep, until 2018. In retirement he has also rejoined the coaching ranks, taking over as head coach of Vicksburg High School’s girls and boys golf teams this school year. MGJ High School Coach Mike Garvey Honored 39 April 2020 www.michigangolfjournal.com