Tourney features a local flavor

Tuesday, Oct. 12, 1999 | 11:20 a.m.

Local golf fans will have plenty of golfers with ties to Las Vegas to follow during this week's $2.5 million Las Vegas Invitational.

A total of 12 players who either call Southern Nevada home, played golf at UNLV or used to live in the Valley are among the 144 professional competing in the 17th annual LVI.

Two former UNLV players, Chris Berry and Charley Hoffman, are beginning their professional careers after graduating from UNLV earlier this year. Berry and Hoffman, members of UNLV's 1998 NCAA Championship team, were granted sponsor exemptions to play in the tournament by the Las Vegas Founders' Club.

Berry, 23, was a two-time All-American for the Rebels as well as the 1998 UNLV Olympic Sportsman of the Year. His play in the 1998 NCAA Division I Men's Golf Championships helped carry the Rebels to their first national championship in the program's history.

Berry, who finished second individually in the 1998 NCAA Championships, will be making his PGA Tour debut this week.

Hoffman, 22, earned All-America honors with the Rebels in 1998. Unlike Berry, Hoffman has played in two PGA Tour events as an amateur. He qualified for the Buick Invitational in San Diego in 1994 and 1996 through an open qualifier, and made the cut in the 1996 event.

Two other Las Vegas residents, Robert Gamez and Edward Fryatt, also were extended sponsor exemptions by the Las Vegas Founders' Club.

Gamez, a Clark High product, lost his PGA Tour card last season after finishing 195th on the PGA Tour money list but has managed to get into 18 tournaments this season, largely on sponsor exemptions.

Gamez, who has two PGA Tour wins to his credit, has earned only $66,061 on the PGA Tour and ranks 214th in earnings. His best finish was a tie for 39th place at the Greater Milwaukee Open in July. He also has played in five Nike Tour events, making only two cuts, and has earned $2,790.

Fryatt, who played at Chaparral High and UNLV, has been enjoying an outstanding year on the Nike Tour, where he has won once, has nine top-10 finishes and ranks sixth on the money list with $169,356.

Fryatt has played in the Las Vegas Invitational on two other occasions via sponsor exemptions. His best finish in his hometown tournament was a tie for 11th place in 1997.

Bob May, a six-year resident of Las Vegas, also was granted one of six sponsor exemptions into the LVI. May turned professional in 1991 and spent the past four seasons playing on the European Tour after losing his exempt status on the PGA Tour.

May won his first professional tournament this summer when he held off Colin Montgomerie to capture the British Masters.

Two regular members of the PGA Tour, UNLV graduate Chris Riley and former Basic High standout Craig Barlow, will join the 144 professionals in the field this week.

Riley, a 1996 graduate of UNLV, is having an outstanding rookie season. He has three top-10 finishes and ranks 113th in earnings with $344,451 -- but has made only $23,000 since May 16.

Riley got off to a fast start, making the cut in six of the first seven tournaments he entered. All three of Riley's top-10 showings came in that seven-week stretch, as did the bulk of his season's earnings.

Barlow enjoyed his best finish on the PGA Tour, a third-place tie at the Buick Challenge earlier this month, and has earned more than $285,000 this year and ranks 130th on the money list.

Another former UNLV player, Skip Kendall, is proving that his breakthrough season last year on the PGA Tour was no fluke. After earning nearly $800,000 in 1998, the 1987 UNLV graduate comes to Las Vegas ranked 35th in earnings with nearly than $955,000, but still searching for his first win of the year.

Tommy Armour III, a product of Bishop Gorman High and a former longtime Las Vegas resident, ranks 53rd on the money list with more than $700,000 and has four top-10 finishes. Armour lost in a playoff in the Tucson Open earlier this year and had a third-place tie at the Doral-Ryder Open in March.

J.L. Lewis, a former golf professional at the Las Vegas Country Club, earned his first PGA Tour victory in July at the John Deere Classic and comes to Las Vegas ranked 63rd on the money list with more than $589,000.

Valley residents Phil Tataurangi and Jeff Gallagher will be looking to have solid showings this week in an attempt to climb into the top 125 in earnings and retain their tour cards for next year.

Tataurangi is 145th on the money list with $232,078 while Gallagher ranks 173rd with $137,872.