When the PGA Tour announced in 2016 that the match play event of the World Golf Championships series was going to Austin, it seemed like a match made in corporate heaven.
Austin was emerging into one of the bigger tech hubs in the nation, its population following suit with a spike that made other CVBs green with envy. And at the time, the WGCs were considered the highest-ranking tournaments in golf behind the four majors and the Players Championship, the Tour’s flagship event.
But the whole thing came tumbling down in 2023, when the Tour made a number of changes to its schedule and the capital of Texas was erased from the schedule.
It appears the hiatus was short-lived, however. According to a story by Sports Business Journal, Austin is poised to be reinserted into the schedule, albeit in a less desirable spot in the schedule. The WGC-Dell Match Play was played two weeks before the Masters in 2023, and with a massive purse and no cut, it boasted one of the season’s best fields.
The new tournament is expected to be dropped into the FedEx Cup Fall, meaning many of the Tour’s best players likely won’t be in attendance.
Here’s more from the story:
The PGA Tour is expected to return to the Austin market with an event in its 2026 FedEx Fall stretch, according to four sources familiar with the plan. The people said the event would be played at the Omni Barton Creek Resort & Spa, which has four golf courses. A title sponsor for the event could not be confirmed. Golf Channel typically carries the fall events. The PGA Tour did not comment for this story.
The Tour is already heavy in Texas with events in Houston, Fort Worth, Dallas and San Antonio, but Austin is a lucrative and desirable market.
And while the Austin news makes sense for a Tour that’s looking to maximize profits under a new regime, it’s not the only move expected to be made.
The Austin event would be one of two changes to date to the 2026 fall schedule. The Mexico Open, which had been a full-field PGA Tour event through 2025, also is moving to the fall stretch with the addition of the new Signature tournament, the Miami Championship. The tour is expected to announce its full 2026 fall slate later this year.
When the Tour pulled out of Austin, Jordan Uppleger, the vice president and executive director of PGA Tour Championship Management, made the announcement to the media at Austin Country Club and hinted that other events could be coming in the future.
“I think you’ve seen this throughout our history. Look at the markets we’ve been in, and we’ve had to exit markets for certain reasons,” Uppleger said in 2023. “And obviously, we would look at Austin, Texas, in the future. It’s not on the ’24 calendar, but clearly look at the success that we’ve had here. There’s no doubt that our team would be looking at that.”
Read the full article here
