I’m a little surprised that I haven’t written about Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Golf Club in the last 14 years. Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Golf Club was designed by Brian Curley and Fred Couples in 2002.
All this despite the fact that the Troon-managed Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Golf Club has hosted such serious golf tournaments as the
- serving as an annual U.S. Open qualifying site,
- 2026 NCAA Men’s Regional Site,
- The PING Southwest Section PGA Section Championship,
- 2021 and 2022 Copper Cup Match,
- 2013 – 2021 web.com/Korn Ferry Qualifying Tournament – 1st Stage
- home of early-state Korn Ferry Tour Qualifying School, etc.
The women’s field is set for the inaugural National Golf Invitational, a new collegiate event to be played May 11-14 at Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Golf Club in Maricopa, Arizona.
Presented in partnership with Golfweek, the 2023 Women’s National Golf Invitational will feature 10 college teams competing in a 54-hole stroke-play tournament. Teams will include:
- Penn State,
- Mercer,
- Iowa,
- Western Carolina,
- Texas State,
- Santa Clara,
- UC Riverside,
- Middle Tennessee,
- Grand Canyon University,
- Seattle.
The teams competing in the 2023 Men’s National Golf Invitational, scheduled to be played May 18-21, will be announced later.
In May 2022, the NCAA announced it would allow schools to play in one season-ending event, similar to college basketball’s NIT.
By July 2022, the inaugural National Golf Invitational was created in a partnership between Golfweek and Ak-Chin Southern Dunes with Golfweek’s Lance Ringler serving as the Invitational’s tournament director.
A committee determined the invitation-only field using both the Golfweek/Sagarin and Golfstat rankings, while also considering teams who had strong regular seasons.
In 2026, Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Golf Club will be a host site for the Men’s Golf NCAA Regionals. The “Top 100 You Can Play” golf course will be one of six Regional sites in the U.S. with each site hosting 14 collegiate teams.
The top five teams from each Regional will advance to the NCAA Championships to be held in 2026 at La Costa Resort and Spa in San Diego, Calif.
The exact dates for the Ak-Chin Southern Dunes Regionals will be announced at a later date, but the tournament is expected to take place in mid-to-late May 2026.