Would people come out and be a part of it when there was still an ongoing pandemic? What kind of sponsor support would there be? And just how much money would they be able to raise to support their scholarship program?
In the end, the only way to adequately describe how things turned out would be to use superlatives that haven’t been invented yet.
A total of 100 golfers descended on the Hillcrest Golf Club on Saturday morning, completely filling out the draw, and through sponsorship and community support, over $6,800 was raised. All proceeds from the event go back into the Women Fore Women scholarship, which goes to graduating female athletes taking part in post-secondary education.
“There’s really no words for it, I’m amazed every time,” said tournament organizer Bev Barber. “It sold out in two and a half weeks. I golf here almost every day and every time I’d come into the clubhouse (manager) Jasmine (Cameron) would say ‘well, we’re at 30 today’, then the next day I’d come and we’d be at 55… It was unbelievable how quickly it came together, and people were so happy to come out and have something to do with COVID, we were really happy to come out and enjoy a beautiful day on the golf course.”
The support from the golfers was one thing. The support from the community was something else entirely -- by the time the Women Fore Women committee was finished gathering sponsorships and donations, every single one of the 100 players was going home with a prize. And that’s on top of financial donations to the program itself.
“Honestly, when we had our first meeting, we were saying ‘if we could collect $1,000 just to keep our scholarship going, that would be nice and maybe we’ll get a few prizes, but we’re not hopeful for anything’,” Barber said. “I actually approached about 25 different businesses and every last one of them said ‘what can we do, what would you like, we want to help people get over COVID and get back to normal’. I can’t say enough about the businesses in Moose Jaw, they’re absolutely fantastic.”
Of course, it certainly doesn’t hurt to know all the money given to the event is going to such a good cause. The tournament handed out three scholarships after its inaugural go-around in 2019 and despite not being able to hold a tournament in 2020, Women Fore Women still donated $500 to Vanier’s Ava Viczko this spring.
On Saturday, a touching thank you letter from Viczko to the Women Fore Women committee was read during the prize presentations, with her words of thanks offering a prime example of how the whole venture is all worthwhile.
“To have that letter from Ava, it just gave me goosebumps,” Barber said. “For her to do that was really, really special.”
Of course, this is a golf tournament, and there were winners -- Warman’s Debbie Davidson and Lori Rittwage took top spot in the Championship Fliight after playing through the fun format of six holes of scramble, six holes of alternate shot and six holes of best score.
Now, the plan is to figure out how to handle what will certainly be a very nice windfall and start looking toward what will undoubtedly be another blast of a tournament next summer.
“We’ll have our meeting in September and figure things out,” Barber said.”The first year we saved money just in case something happened, and it was a very good thing we did that. We’ll make some decisions and we’ll see what happens.”
One thing that’s for certain, the Hillcrest Ladies League will once again be back to support Women Fore Women, just like the first two years of the event.
“It’s a lot of work, and a lot of thanks have to go out to the Hillcrest Ladies League,” Barber said. “You put out the word and they show up and do what needs to be done. I can’t say enough about their support, they’re great citizens of Moose Jaw and members of our golf club.”
