Part-time Denver resident Kevin Stadler made his first cut in a PGA Tour-sanctioned tournament since 2014 on Sunday by finishing 22nd in the Web.com Tour’s Rust-Oleum Championship in Ivanhoe, Ill.
Stadler (left), winner of the 2014 Waste Management Phoenix Open on the PGA Tour and four events on the Web.com Tour, hasn’t competed on the PGA Tour since 2015 due to a stress fracture in his left hand. He played in the Digital Ally Open on the Web.com Tour last summer, but withdrew after one completed round.
“It’s a long, stupid story, but in the long run I ended up getting cut (having surgery) last August,” Stadler said. “I still wasn’t sure that was going to fix anything, but it took six, eight months. I was kind of able to swing January, February of this year. It really rapidly got better the last few months. I’ve been pretty much been pain-free for the last couple months.”
At the Rust-Oleum, Stadler went 71-69-71-68 for a 9-under-par 279 total, which left the 38-year-old eight strokes behind champion Chase Wright. The Kent Denver graduate made an eagle, five birdies and three bogeys in the final round. Another Colorado product, Wyndham Clark, also tied for 22nd place (73-68-67-71).
Stadler is on a major medical extension from the PGA Tour, and when he returns to that circuit, he’ll have 26 events left on that extension, needing to earn $717,890 in those events to keep his exempt status on the PGA Tour.
Stadler won the Colorado Open in 2002 and the CGA Match Play in 1999 and ’02.
CoBank Colorado Senior Open Champ Notches Top-10 on PGA Tour Champions: John Riegger parlayed his victory earlier this month in the CoBank Colorado Senior Open into a ninth-place finish on PGA Tour Champions, in the Principal Charity Classic in Des Moines, Iowa.
Riegger, who won a PGA Tour Champions event in 2013, now owns eight top-10 showings on that circuit, but managed his first since 2016.
In Des Moines, he shot rounds of 69-67 for an 8-under-par 136 in the weather-shortened event. Tom Lehman won with a 131 total after weather washed out Sunday’s action.
Another Top-10 on Symetra Tour for Ex-Buff Lee: Former University of Colorado golfer Esther Lee finished a professional-best seventh on Sunday and notched her third top-10 since May 1 on the Symetra Tour.
Lee carded rounds of 70-69-69 and posted an 8-under-par 208 total in the Four Winds Invitational, which put her three strokes behind winner Maia Schechter in South Bend, Ind.
Since the beginning of May, Lee has finished 10th, eighth and seventh on the Symetra Tour, in addition to missing two cuts.
