High Point, NC – After a two-week hiatus from tournament play, the eGolf Tour will return to action next week in High Point, NC for the fourth annual Willow Creek Open, to be contested at the Willard Byrd-designed Willow Creek Country Club on May 21-23, 2014. One of the years strongest fields will be on hand to compete for a minimum $100,000 purse on what is arguably one of the most popular venues on the tour’s rotation.

High Point Country Club's demanding Willow Creek course hosted the LPGA Tour's Planters Pat Bradley International for 10 years - an event that was won six times by a future LPGA Hall of Fame member. In addition, the course has hosted 11 Carolinas Golf Association championships, including the prestigious Carolinas Amateur and North Carolina Amateur a combined five times.

“We have cemented our reputation as a tour looking to play PGA TOUR-caliber venues on a week in, week out basis, since our inception in 2002,” said eGolf Tour president David Siegel. “Willow Creek exceeds that criteria with a truly classic layout that our players look forward to competing on each year, as evidenced by the quality of field the event attracts annually.”

Both nines at Willow Creek begin on high ground adjacent to the clubhouse, then play down towards river valleys that accentuate both sides. Meandering Abbotts Creek provides ample hazard to 10 holes on the Willow Creek course, and offers a scenic boundary for those holes to be played along. The greens were converted to Champion Bermuda in 2012, in turn giving way to some of the best surfaces in the Carolinas.

The inaugural Willow Creek Open in 2011 saw former N.C. State star Jerry Richardson win in runaway fashion, utilizing a hole-in-one on his 70th hole of the tournament en route to a commanding five-shot victory over Nathan Stamey and Stephen Poole.

The event’s 2012 edition was somewhat of a homecoming for 2007 British Amateur champion and Willow Creek member Drew Weaver, who recorded a masterful, bogey-free 67 in the final round to win his second career tour title with a one-shot victory over fellow British Am champion Jin Jeong (2010).

The win came during a furious stretch of golf for Weaver, who notched a total of two victories and four runner-up finishes in a seven-event span en route to winning the tour’s money title in 2012. The former Virginia Tech star reached the $100,000 mark in season-long earnings with a July win at the Southern Open, in turn becoming the fastest player in tour history to eclipse six figures in a single year.

Last year’s Willow Creek Open saw Josh Persons of Fargo, ND pick up his first tour win with a 14-under-par tally, good for a one-shot victory over current leading money winner Seamus Power, who bogeyed two of his final four holes to finish in solo-second place. Persons, a former standout at the University of Minnesota, posted just two bogeys during the entire event, and erased a four-shot deficit in the final round with a bogey-free 65.

“Part of what makes this event great is the incredible finishes it produces,” said Siegel. “We’ve had dramatic aces down the stretch, a Drew Weaver post-win fist pump at the last in and around friends and family, and a spectacular final-round charge by Josh last year. The combination of a stellar field and a championship venue helps to make the Willow Creek Open one of our premier tournaments.”

Players of note in this year’s field include:

Drew Weaver (High Point, NC)

Weaver will be returning to his home club for the fourth straight year, having surrounded the 2012 win with T28 and T38 finishes in 2011 and 2013, respectively. After a disappointing 2013 campaign with ten top-25s but just one top-10, the 26-year-old Atlanta, GA resident has played well early this year, notching five top-16 finishes in six starts – including top-10s at the season-opening Palmetto Hall Championship (T8) and Cowans Ford Open (T9).

Seamus Power

Seamus Power (West Waterford, Ireland)

The tour’s current leading money winner with $33,414 in earnings, Power earned the third win of his eGolf Tour career at the Cowans Ford Open in March. The former East Tennessee State star has been a study in consistency thus far in 2014, posting top-6 finishes in each of his five starts, including a runner-up at the Columbia Open two weeks ago. The 27-year-old held a share of the 36-hole lead at last year’s Willow Creek Open, but wound up with a runner-up finish after final-round bogeys on 15 and 18 left him one-shot shy of winner Josh Persons.

Kevin Lucas (Folsom, CA)

Lucas, 25, will be making his first career start on the eGolf Tour after starring this year on the California-based eGolf Tour West. The former University of Nevada golfer has recorded top-10s in each of his seven starts, including a win at the Oak Valley Classic in February and runner-ups at the Championship at Morongo and Championship at PGA West. eGolf West’s leading money winner with $36,823 in earnings, Lucas is more than $7,800 clear of No. 2 on the money list.

Ryan Sullivan (Winston-Salem, NC)

Longtime eGolf Tour member is a member of the Web.com Tour this year, where he has made two of three cuts through the tour’s South American and Texas swing. The former UNC Wilmington golfer won PGA TOUR Latinoamerica’s Puerto Rico Classic in the fall of 2013 – a win that came with an exemption into the PGA TOUR’s Puerto Rico Open in March. In his second career start in a TOUR-sanctioned event (MC, 2013 U.S. Open), Sullivan finished T43. The 25-year-old has six top-10s in his eGolf Tour career, including a T4 at the Columbia Open earlier this month, where he was the event’s 18-, 36- and 54-hole leader.

Matthew Ryan

Matthew Ryan (Santa Clarita, CA)

Former Fresno State star and Power’s roommate missed the cut at Palmetto Hall, but has since posted three straight top-4 finishes to sit at No. 2 on the tour’s money list with $21,066 in earnings. The lefty has two runner-up finishes on his 2014 eGolf Tour resume, falling one-shot shy of winner J.T. Griffin at Callawassie Island, and losing on the second playoff hole to Kevin Roy at the Championship at St. James last month. Between starts, Ryan trekked to Guadalajara, Mexico to compete on PGA TOUR Latinoamerica, where he finished tied for second after losing out in a seven-man playoff for the title.

Other notable players in the field at Willow Creek include five-time eGolf Tour winner Ryan Nelson (Charleston, SC), defending champion Josh Persons (Fargo, ND), 2013 leading money winner Frank Adams III (Laurinburg, NC), Tadd Fujikawa (Honolulu, HI) and 10-year PGA TOUR member Craig Barlow (Henderson, NV).

Local players of note include Preston Dembowiak (Greensboro, NC), Mark Kriston (Clemmons, NC), Isaac Spencer (Winston-Salem, NC), Travis Stewart (Jamestown, NC) and Chase Wilson (High Point University).

The event will be the seventh of 15 regular season events on the tour’s 2014 schedule, which will give way this fall to the inaugural Million Dollar Championship Series – a series of four tournaments highlighted by $1,000,000 in overall prize money.

eGolf’s 2014 Million Dollar Championship Series will feature guaranteed purses of $225,000, $225,000, $250,000 and $300,000, with the winner of the fourth and final championship series event receiving a $50,000 first-place prize. The second of the four-event series, the Island View Casino Championship, will be contested in Gulfport, MS on September 9-12, 2014. The remaining three events will be announced in the coming weeks, with the $300,000 eGolf Tour Championship slated for December 2-5, 2014 in the Orlando, FL area.

Opening-round play at Willow Creek will begin on Wednesday, May 21st at 8:00 AM, with players competing in threesomes off of Nos. 1 and 10 tees. Following the conclusion of 36 holes, the field will be cut to the low 35 percent and ties for Friday’s final round of play. The tournament is open to the public and free of charge. For more information on the event, or the eGolf Tour, please visit www.egolf.com.