These nine states have never hosted a PGA Tour event

This week the PGA Tour visits the First State for the time.

Wilmington Country Club will play host, marking the PGA Tour’s first-ever event in the state of Delaware and the 10th different venue to host the BMW Championship since the inception of the FedEx Cup in 2007.

“You’ve got to hit it as far as you can and hit a lot of fairways,” advised BMW defending champion and reigning FedEx Cup champion Patrick Cantlay.

Delaware becomes the 41^st state in the union to host a Tour event, but that means there are still nine states that are still hoping their day in the sun is still to come.

Maine is one of the nine remaining states that have never hosted a Tour event. Professional golf has been absent from northeast New England, five states within the Mountain Time Zone and Alaska. Some states barely avoided making the list. Nebraska was spared solely by the 1933 Nebraska Open, Idaho’s Coeur d’Alene hosted the 1992 Merrill Lynch Shootout and Arkansas made headlines with the Arlington Hotel Open from 1955-63.

Some of these states have hosted Nationwide, Champions and LPGA events, but the locals are waiting patiently for Rory, Tiger and Jordan to grace them with their presence.

Here’s a list of some of the golf courses that could potentially host the stars of the PGA Tour someday. (Special thanks to longtime Golfweek reader and journalist Peter Kollmann, who helped with the research.)

Alaska

Photo courtesy Fort Wainright MWR.

Our choice: Chena Bend, Fort Wainwright, Fairbanks – The Chena River winds through this course near Fort Wainwright military base. If the pros come here to a layout that ranks second in the state in Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play, it had better be in mid-summer.

Maine

No. 9 looking back from the green at Sugarloaf Mountain Golf and Town Club, Minneola, Fla. Course ranked No. 4.

Photo courtesy Sugarloaf Golf Club.

Our choice: Sugarloaf, Carrabassett Valley – Robert Trent Jones’ mountain jewel would make a great fit for Jim Furyk and his caddie Mike “Fluff” Cowan, a Maine resident.

Montana

No. 16 at Old Works.

Our choice: Old Works, Anaconda – Jack Nicklaus’ creativity glows here, as the course near the Continental Divide sits on the former site of a century-old copper smelter. It ranks second in the state in Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play.

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