The PNC Championship is taking place this week at the Ritz Carlton Golf Club in Orlando, Fla. The long-standing event has traditionally featured teams of fathers and sons, with many PGA Tour and PGA Tour Champions professionals teaming up with their dads, sons, grandsons or nephews for the event.
But in recent years, the tournament has begun to see some players, like Steve Stricker and Bernard Langer, bring their daughters into the fold and has also started inviting LPGA Tour members to tee it up alongside their family members in the yearly team-play event.
Seven-time 2024 winner and Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings No. 1 Nelly Korda is making her third PNC Championship appearance this week in Orlando alongside her father, Petr, and is wrapping up what’s been a historic season for the 26-year-old. Earlier this year, Korda became just the third LPGA Tour member since 1978 to win five consecutive tournaments in five consecutive starts after capturing her second career major title at The Chevron Championship in April, joining a short list that only includes Nancy Lopez and Annika Sorenstam.
Her victory streak was broken after she tied for seventh at the Cognizant Founders Cup, but Korda ultimately picked up right where she left off in her very next tournament, defeating Hannah Green by one shot in the Mizuho Americas Open at Liberty National Golf Club to earn her sixth title of the 2024 season.
Korda then won again at The ANNIKA driven by Gainbridge at Pelican in November, making her the first athlete since Yani Tseng in 2011 to win seven times in a single season on the LPGA Tour. The 14-time LPGA Tour winner also took home the Rolex ANNIKA Major Award this year and clinched Rolex Player of the Year honors after the conclusion of the TOTO Japan Classic in early November.
This is Korda’s third time playing in the PNC Championship with her dad, Petr, as the father-daughter duo made their tournament debut in 2020, finishing in solo 12th. They have since competed in the 2022 and 2023 PNC Championships, tying for fifth and tying for 13th in those two appearances, respectively.
Nelly and Petr will tee off at 10:31 a.m. local time in the first round of the PNC Championship on Saturday, December 21, and will be playing alongside Fred Couples and his stepson, Hunter Hannemann.
Sorenstam became the first woman to compete in the PNC Championship back in 2019, teeing it up with her father Tom and ultimately tying for 19th in their first start at Ritz Carlton Golf Club. Annika and Tom again played together in 2020, that time finishing solo 17th, but Annika’s son, Will McGee, has taken the place of his grandfather in the last two PNC Championships that Sorenstam has participated in, tying for 17th with his mother in 2022 and tying for 11th in the 2023 edition of the event.
This week’s PNC Championship marks Annika and Will’s third time competing as partners, and the two are just as excited as they were a couple of years ago to once again be in the 2024 field. And now that Will has gotten a little bit older and a little bit more experienced, having quite a bit of success in the junior events in which he has teed it up this past year, the mother-son duo are hoping to be able to contend for their first PNC Championship title over the weekend in Orlando, Fla., in what has become an annual family affair for the Sorenstam/McGee household.
“It’s wonderful to be back,” Sorenstam said in a pre-tournament press conference. “This is one of the highlights of the year. We’re so thankful to PNC for having us. It’s great to be here in Orlando, (our) hometown, and come in and play here with family and friends. We have a good time.”
Will, who definitely seems to possess the competitive edge that made his mom so lethal when playing on the LPGA Tour, always has this event circled on the calendar each year and relishes every opportunity he has to tee it up in a tournament setting alongside the Hall of Famer, who he hopes to one day emulate at the highest level.
“It’s a lot of fun. I look forward to this week every year,” Will said. “It’s like, I’m happy that it’s right here, but it’s also sad because in a few days, it’s already gone. We still have the weekend, so it will be fun.”
