Sumter golf set to host 20th-annual Magnolia Invitational Monday

When Sumter High golf coach Jeff Schaffer first came to the Gamecock city, he wanted to bring a premier high school golf tournament to the area.

In his first season, Schaffer created the Magnolia Invitational. Twenty years later, the tournament is still running strong. The annual tournament returns to Beech Creek Golf Club on Monday.

"When I first got here, we didn't have that many tournaments for boys. We had a lot of matches, but these kids aren't getting recruited off matches. They're getting recruited off tournaments," Schaffer said of initially starting the Magnolia Invitational.

The Magnolia Invitational is different from other high school tournaments. Generally, teams have five golfers and the top four scores count toward the final tally. In the Magnolia Invitational, there are four golfers from each school, and the top three make up the team score.

"Early in the spring, your roster is not always set yet," Schaffer said. "It actually makes the tournament play faster. We can put them out in threesomes and get them out there."

The tournament was immediately successful, though it has gone through a number of iterations since 2002. Schaffer wanted it to be a premier event, so there were often large prizes awarded to the winners and smaller competitions for things like longest drive or a hole to fight for the closest shot to the pin.

The South Carolina High School League has since limited the giveaways, but Schaffer still wants to reward players for competing.

"The big thing is our sponsors. I can't say enough about how much Beech Creek has gone out of their way to help us do this," Schaffer said. "You have to have a golf course that's willing to help the kids, and they've gone above and beyond in that.

"And our other sponsors, Ping Golf, Titleist, Bridgestone, when you get the quality of vendors that are willing to cough up a little bit for the kids, it makes it really nice for the players."

There will be 22 teams competing in the two-day tournament, with the first tee time set for noon each day. The golfers will play 36 holes.

"We've got some pretty decent teams playing in it this year," Schaffer said. "I wouldn't say there's any one team that stands out in front of everyone else. It's going to be a pretty competitive field."

Sumter has a young squad this year with a pair of sophomores, an eighth-grader and a junior taking part in this week's tournament. This will provide those young players a chance to learn how to compete against some of the best South Carolina has to offer.

"Every tournament you play in - I don't care what level of competition you're playing at - even in the pros there's going to be butterflies in your stomach. The guys that play in more and more tournaments, they kind of know how to get through that," Schaffer said. "For these kids to play in this tournament, that in the road should help us develop as a team before we get into the region tournament and, hopefully, the state tournament."