Twenty years later, bond still remains for '88 champs
April 24, 2008 | Men's Golf
April 24, 2008
Champaign, Ill. - Editor's Note: Illinois heads to Michigan State this weekend to compete in the Big Ten Championships. This is the story of the last Big Ten title team from Illinois 20 years ago.
Last September at Westchester Country Club in suburban New York City, two college friends shared a special weekend on the golf course. Don Edwards, a native of the state, had played the course an estimated 500-1,000 times growing up and had been club champion. There he was with his friend and PGA great Steve Stricker, the tour's Comeback Player of the Year, who was playing in the first event of the first ever FedEx Championship. With all his success, Stricker hadn't won on tour in some six years. Edwards had talked to Stricker about the course a few weeks earlier and followed his progress that weekend in the gallery. Stricker ended the six-year win drought, by edging K.J. Choi by two strokes to capture the Barclay's Tournament and over $1.2 million in prize money.
Stricker and Edwards were part of a close-knit team, whose bond still exists today. Edwards was a senior and Stricker a junior in 1988 at Illinois, when, with senior Mike Small, sophomore Kevin Fairfield, and sophomore Heath Crawford, the Illini won the Big Ten title. The team came from near and far - Stricker from Wisconsin, Fairfield from Atlanta, and Crawford (Rock Island) and Small (Danville) from Illinois. As for any title winner, memories from the experience remain and each one is doing his part to bring Illinois another championship.
Edwards and Small were part of coach Ed Beard's youth movement. Their freshmen year, Illinois placed dead last in the conference, but with a year of development and the emergence of Stricker, a rising star in the game, and Fairfield, Illinois placed second and fourth in the league the next two seasons. That set the stage for the 1987-88 season.
"All of them were capable of playing at a high level," Beard recalled. "Edwards was consistent, Kevin played in a few PGA events, Heath did a nice job during spring semester, and Mike's game was starting to develop."
There's no secret, however, that the key to the team's success was Stricker. Beard discovered Stricker playing a few statewide events, winning the Junior State and Wisconsin State Amateur titles. By his own admission, Beard was fortunate to land a player with Stricker's ability.
"I did my homework on him and made a lot of trips to Wisconsin to see him play," Beard recalled. "He didn't play as much on the national scene or we would have probably been out-recruited by some of the southern schools. When he did play Florida tournaments, it was during the winter and he wasn't as sharp. He had talent you don't see much in someone his age. His short game, his confidence, and his overall strength made him a standout."
"I remember winning the Western Junior and everyone telling me I should try to start thinking about a pro career," recalled Edwards. "Seeing a player like Steve made me realize it was going to be a challenge. You might play even with Steve for 10 or 12 holes, but all of a sudden, he would fire off about five birdies in a row. He would get hot and shoot 30 on the back nine. That was something for the rest of us would be hard to pull off. Every part of his game seemed a lot better than all of us in the Big Ten."
While most winning teams have an elite player, all have a strong supporting cast.
There was Small, who was strong around the green. "We used to say Mike could get it up and down from a garbage can," Edwards remembers. "He had the ability to make par from anywhere. As he improved his ball striking after college, he just got better and better."
There was Crawford, the engineer on the team, whom Edwards remembers sharing a light in the back of the van so they could study. There was Fairfield, the quiet one on the team with a dry sense of humor. There was Edwards, who chose to come to a school in the north to keep the same playing routine he had in New York.
"We had great chemistry on those teams," Stricker said. "What I remember most was not so much the golf we played, but the times we spent off the golf course together. We would play pick-up basketball games together and Coach Beard had us together working out during the off-season."
Beard was the architect.
"He was old school," Edwards recalled. "If we played really well, we'd go to Sizzler, if we didn't, we'd go to McDonald's. He was ahead of his time in one regard: he made us lift weights and get up at 6 a.m. to run in the Armory. We thought he was crazy, but it turned out he was right. Now days, it's standard procedure."
"Coach had some interesting ways to motivate for sure," Crawford recalled. "More than anything, he could see how good we could be and didn't want us to get complacent."
"Coach Beard helped me with some different shots and how to hit the ball lower," said Stricker. "It was a pretty important piece for me in my development as a player."
The Illini played the season with the knowledge that the '88 championship would be decided on their home course in Savoy. In their way was juggernaut Ohio State, winners of 11 of the previous 12 titles, including six straight. Illinois and Ohio State met six times throughout the season with each team winning three times, two of Ohio State's victories coming in Columbus.
Behind Small's individual title, Illinois won the biggest tournament of the fall, the Butler Intercollegiate, with the Buckeyes placing sixth. Stricker missed the first round of a tournament in April at Ohio State to attend a family funeral and the Buckeyes downed the Illini by 40 strokes. Behind Stricker's 208, Illinois won the Midwestern Invitational by one stroke over OSU two weeks later. However, future pros Ted Tryba and Chris Smith finished 1-2 the next weekend to pace the Buckeyes to a 10-stroke victory over Illinois at the Northern Intercollegiate right before the Big Ten Championship.
"We got a taste of success early in the spring," Crawford said. "Because of that we realized what we could achieve."
At the Big Ten Championship, Sticker, Small and Crawford each fired 70s and Edwards a 72 on the par-72 Orange Course as Illinois scored a season-best 282 in round two to bolt to an 18-stroke lead. Stricker's round included an eagle on the 536-yard par-5 17th. Crawford finished three-under 33 on the back nine, including an eagle on 13 and a birdie on 16. Despite missing opportunities to close out Saturday's third round, Illinois maintained a 16-stroke lead over the Buckeyes heading into the final 18 holes.
"It was a big deal in town," Crawford said. "We were on the front page of the paper every day and we had a great following on the course."
OSU's most famous golf alum, Jack Nicklaus, was in the gallery on Sunday to follow his son, Gary, who was a freshman at Ohio State. Edwards, who had been paired with the younger Nicklaus several times that season, played with him in the Big Ten's final round. "I have the incredible memory of battling Ohio State, having Jack watch us the whole time and feeling a little pressure," Edwards said. "Getting to talk to him on the course was amazing."
Sunday's round also brought strong Midwest winds. "I remember the wind blowing over tents," Beard said. "Steve and Mike both played the last nine holes in a gale of a wind. We were used to it. Maybe that helped."
"I think the wind got to other teams and really messed them up," Small said. "I remember Jack Nicklaus was even intimidated by the greens and the wind at Savoy, so I think that might have spread to Ohio State a bit."
It didn't bother Stricker, who fired his third straight 70 to win his second of three Big Ten titles, bettering second-place Small and Smith by 14 strokes in leading Illinois to a wire-to-wire championship, 20 strokes better than OSU.
"After we won the Big Ten Championship, we all had a party together," Stricker said. "All of our parents were there. It was a big family atmosphere."
With Stricker, Fairfield and Crawford in the line-up, the Illini placed second in 1989, then second again Fairfield and Crawford's senior year in 1990, but the 1988 championship still remains as the only conference title for Illinois in men's golf since 1941.
That's something Illinois is hoping to change and it's the members of the '88 team that are helping to make it happen. Stricker returns every August for a benefit golf classic to help raise money for the program. Edwards has used resources from his success in business to endow a scholarship for both the business school and the golf program. After playing a few years full-time on tour, Small has returned to take over for Beard as head coach of the Fighting Illini and continues to have some success as a part-time professional player. Sadly, Stricker, Crawford, Small, and Edwards attended the funeral of Fairfield, who died of cancer in 2001.
"There was something special about that team," Edwards said. "For us it's not like, `Hey, this happened 20 years ago.' We are all involved in the golf program to this day. To be a part of a group like that is very nice."
"We now aspire to have that same feeling and sensation again," said Small, whose teams have three conference runners-up finishes. "People remember the winners, they don't remember who finishes second. I know what it feels like to win and I want to share that again with my players."
Because of his competitiveness, Edwards doesn't play golf that much anymore, knowing that he won't be able to play at that level with his energy focused on his career. "I'm more interested in Mike and Steve's game now," he said.
Edwards still has time for his family and friends, however. That's what brought him out to Westchester that September weekend. The bond of that championship team continues to live on.
