What a long, strange trip it has been for Lucas Glover.
Winning the 2009 U.S. Open at Bethpage Black has become the signature victory of four PGA Tour titles since turning pro out of Clemson in 2001. Among the spoils at the time for Glover was a berth in the Grand Slam of Golf at Port Royal Golf Course on the western tip of Bermuda.
Glover returns this week to Southampton, Bermuda, to compete in the PGA Tour’s Butterfield Bermuda Championship, where he’ll be the only player in the 132-man field with a plaque on the course: “Man, I’ve never been so nervous on a shot.”
The marker recognizes Glover’s victory in the now-defunct event, which consisted of that season’s four major winners. It sits on the back tee box of the infamous 235-yard par-3 16th hole, which demands a tee shot to a spit of land that practically hangs over the water. Until Tuesday, Glover had only seen the plaque in photos that friends had sent him. He explained that his quote was less about the difficulty of the shot at the Robert Trent Jones Sr. design than teeing off steps away from the South Shore cliff and fearing the potential plunge.
“It’s good to be back. It’s always good to come back to a place where you have had success,” said Glover, whose caddie this week is Steve Lambert Jr., moonlighting from his regular job as the head golf professional at Port Royal. “It’s 13 years ago, so it doesn’t even matter anymore, but it’s always nice to be where you’ve had some success.”
Glover, 42, ended a decade-long victory drought at the 2021 John Deere Classic and last season snuck into the FedEx Cup Playoffs, where he had his best result of the year to date at the FedEx St. Jude Championship, finishing tied for third.
“I had a good playoffs, let’s put it that way. It wasn’t a great year leading up to it, but took advantage of being in Memphis,” he said last week at the CJ Cup in South Carolina. “Yeah, I still feel like I can play out here.”
He returns to a course that is short on the scorecard – at a mere 6,828 yards it is the shortest course of those used for Tour events – but long on demands for precision shotmaking. Its winding fairways are banked by blooming oleander and whispering casuarina pines and its hilltop greens afford stunning views of turquoise sea, craggy coral rock formations, swaying palm trees and white-roofed, pastel cottages.
The back nine is considered more attractive – with views of Hamilton Harbor from Nos. 11 and 12 – as well as more challenging because the wind frequently blows from the west. Describing it as a triumph of design over distance, Seamus Power, who finished T-12 last year and is one of 10 players to make the cut in all three editions of this event, said the fickle wind off the ocean makes up for a lack of length.
“The course is kind of designed for it, which I like. It kind of helps you picture some of the shots with wind directions,” said Power, noting he’s hit both sand wedge and 3-wood for his second shot at the 517-yard par-5, seventh hole. “I’ve seen it in all different winds at this point and it’s just fun, all sorts of different shots here, uphill and down, makes it fun to play, makes it challenging, but it’s kind of enjoyable.”
The field lacks star power – at No. 48 in the world, Power is the top-ranked player in the field with just four more players inside the top 100. Also missing is defending champion Lucas Herbert, who opted to attend a wedding back home in Australia.
But a win here comes with plenty of perks and as a standalone event for the third straight year, it dishes out 500 FedEx Cup points to the champion. European Tour Ryder Cup Captain Luke Donald, hungry Korn Ferry Tour grads such as Taylor Montgomery and S.H. Kim, who already have proven they belong in the big leagues, 56-year-old fan favorite John Daly and 18-year-old future star Caleb Surratt, a freshman at Tennessee, are all in the field.
Should they ever decide to add a plaque at Port Royal for Power, the 35-year-old Irishman happily would take it at another of the course’s postcard par-3 holes.
“You walk back to 8 tee and then you turn back around, it’s really our first time seeing the ocean on the course,” he said. “I always think that moment is gorgeous there. You’re just seeing the sunshine off the water and it’s spectacular.”
