This late in the season, the top players often have separated themselves in Golfweek’s senior player-of-the-year races. And while that is certainly the case in some age groups, the race remains tight in the Super Legends division. Only 110 points separates leader Johnny Blank of Frostburg, Maryland, from George Owens of Virginia Beach, Virginia.
Blank is trying to end a third consecutive season as the Super Legends Player of the Year. In 2023, he finished 1,635 points ahead of Bill Engel of St. Augustine, Florida. Engel, the former Commander of the White Sands Missile Range, is 830 points behind Blank. John Osborne of Vero Beach, Florida, is wedged into that mix too, trailing Blank by only 380 points.
Blank has competed largely in the Southeast this season, logging the most points for winning his division at the SOS Spring Classic and Super Senior in February.
Golfweek awards Player of the Year honors for each of four age divisions: Senior, Super Senior, Legends and Super Legends. Winners will be recognized Jan. 16 at the Golfweek Player of the Year Classic at Omni Orlando Resort at ChampionsGate.
George Owens
In the Super Senior division, top-ranked Jim Starnes has racked up many of his 7,547 points in the Southeast as well, but he has also made two trips west with impressive results.
Starnes, of Fort Myers, Florida, leads Greg Goode, of Salina, Kansas, by 1,297 points. Starnes reaped big points for his victories early in the year at the Florida Azalea Senior and the Lowcountry Senior Amateur. His trips west to the Golfweek Senior Amateur in Palm Desert, California, and the Golfweek Pacific Northwest Senior in Walla Walla, Washington, both produced top-5 finishes.
Starnes finished 2023 third on the points list for his division, and in 2016 he was named the Senior Player of the Year as the top points-getter.
Golfweek National Senior Amateur Rankings
To claim a POY title is a labor of love that requires men like Starnes to tee it up frequently and to play well. For Starnes, that means 22 to 25 national senior starts, plus a half dozen four-ball events and a few Florida State Golf Association events.
His has long been a name to know in senior golf: Starnes qualified for the U.S. Senior Amateur in 2016 and 2021.
Perhaps no one knows the term “labor of love” better than Kevin VandenBerg when it comes to winning player-of-the-year honors. VandenBerg has a nearly 3,000-point lead in the Senior division and has POY honors all but locked up for the second consecutive year.
Kevin VandenBerg. (Photo: Ron Gaines/Golfweek)
VandenBerg aged into senior competition when he turned 55 in 2021. He has not slowed down since. In 2023, VandenBerg, of Pulaski, New York, teed it up in competition 44 times between Golfweek senior events, Society of Senior events, local tournaments and USGA qualifiers.
He’ll beat that number this year. VandenBerg told Golfweek he has already competed 44 times – finishing first, first, second, second and third in his past five starts – and has six more events planned before the end of the calendar year.
VandenBerg will be inducted into the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame on Oct. 27 for a career that includes his sweep (in the summer of 2000) of Michigan’s three major amateur tournaments: the Michigan Amateur, Golf Association of Michigan Championship and the Michigan Mid-Amateur.
In the Legends division, Bev Hargraves of Little Rock, Arkansas, leads Don Donatoni of Malvern, Pennsylvania, by 950 points. Hargraves notably won his division at the 2024 Golfweek Player of the Year Classic.