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Hurley debuts charity tournament at Navy; "Billy Hurley III and the Brave" brings servicemen to Naval course

Capital - 8/1/2017

Billy Hurley III is known in golf circles for his dedication to giving back to the military, but this may be his biggest charitable undertaking yet.

Hurley hosted his inaugural charity event, the "Billy Hurley III and the Brave Golf Tournament," Monday at the U.S. Naval Academy Golf Course in Annapolis.

Eighteen active duty servicemen won raffle drawings at military base golf courses across the country to come to Annapolis, meet Hurley and play a scramble tournament at the Academy course. The charity tournament was paired with a 36-hole Middle Atlantic PGA junior invitational, the "Billy Hurley III Junior Championship," which kicked off Monday morning and will conclude Tuesday.

The proceeds benefited Navy Athletics and the Anchor Scholarship Foundation, which supports the spouses and children of Surface Navy personnel.

Hurley, the only military veteran on the PGA Tour, is a Naval Academy graduate who served five years in the Navy, rose to lieutenant and now makes his home in Annapolis.

"(I had been) thinking about doing some sort of charity event, but how do you make it a little bit different? How do you make it a little bit meaningful?" Hurley said, adding his business manager Jana Smoley should receive some credit for thinking up the format.

He also said his wife, Heather, played an integral role in organizing the event.

"She's been running around, putting everything together today," he said. "Between Heather and I, we really want to honor and support military families as much as anything."

Presenting sponsor Leidos, a defense and cybersecurity company and one of the event's 24 corporate sponsors, presented the Anchor Scholarship Foundation with a $60,000 donation to endow a new, recurring scholarship. It is Hurley's first time working with Anchor.

Servicemen came to Annapolis from as far as Texas, Florida and Tennessee, while others, like Ryan Carton, were local. A Navy senior enlisted executive adviser stationed at the White House Military Office, Carton stood out from the crowd with American flag shoes and socks, red and blue knickers and a full-sized American flag he kept on his golf cart.

"Everybody's like, 'What's the occasion?' It's like, 'It's America. There is no occasion. It's America every day,'" Carton said.

Carton, a golfer for 27 years, first met Hurley earlier this month at TPC Potomac at the Quicken Loans National PGA Tour stop, where he was volunteering and taking part in activities honoring the military. He remembers getting the call that he was chosen to play in "Billy Hurley III and the Brave" shortly after that.

Like the other servicemen at the event, Carton enjoyed his day on the links.

"It was great, just a great time for the guys to get away and relax and (have) a change of pace from the regular, daily grind of stuff," he said. "That's what's great about getting on the course. It doesn't matter what you shoot, but hey, a good day on the course is a good day."

Around 1 p.m., between the junior tournament's first round and the servicemen's shotgun start, Hurley and his caddie, Clay Duerson, held a short-game clinic for both the juniors and adults in attendance. Hurley chipped to a practice green and took questions from the crowd.

Kelly Chinn, 14, from Great Falls, Virginia, was one of the junior tournament's 60 players. Chinn earned an exemption by placing in the top 20 at the Middle Atlantic Junior PGA Championship at the Naval Academy course in June, but he also has a military tie to Monday's proceedings: Chinn's father has served in the Navy for over 30 years.

"Obviously we got great tips, and it's great to see someone from the Navy and a PGA Tour member coming out here and helping out everyone," Chinn said.

Chinn stayed to watch Hurley's short-game lesson and feels he learned a lot.

"How I'm practicing is really something I'm trying to work on, and he was talking about where to land the ball, chipping and all that stuff," Chinn said. "I'll see if that helps me in the future."

Hurley was happy with how the debut event went, and while he said ideas for how to expand on it in the future "haven't surfaced to the front of the brain" yet, it's clear the tournament will return next year.

"We're certainly excited to continue this and grow it," he said.

Credit: By Adam Zielonka - azielonka@baltsun.com

Caption: PGA golfer and Annapolis resident Billy Hurley III conducts a golf clinic as part of the inaugural Billy Hurley III and the Brave Golf Tournament at the Naval Academy golf course in Annapolis.

Billy Hurley III (left) introduces the military servicemen who were picked to play in his inaugural charity tournament, the "Billy Hurley III and the Brave Golf Tournament," at the U.S. Naval Academy Golf Course in Annapolis.

Joshua A McKerrow/Capital Gazette

Adam Zielonka/Capital Gazette