This Richland High grad is finding success on the pro golf circuit

Trying to make your way in professional golf is an absolute grind.

There are so many golfers out there looking to make a name for themselves on a number of pro tours and mini-tours.

So it’s nice to see when someone from the Mid-Columbia finds success.

Richland’s Drew McCullough fired an 8-under par 64 on Friday in the final round of the Temecula Creek Shootout to win the latest stop on the Golden State Tour.

The Golden State Tour, which began in 1982, is one of the longest running professional mini-tours in the country.

It has various stops around California and other western states.

For his efforts, McCullough — who played golf at Richland High and then at the University of Wyoming — earned $1,500.

His two rounds at Temecula Creek were a 71 and the 64, for a 9-under-par score of 135. That was 7 strokes better than the next closest competitor.

Now living in Rancho Santa Margarita — “trying to get out of the cold weather and play every day” — likes to play in a mini-tour event when it’s convenient.

“If something is close to me, I’ll do it,” said McCullough, who completed his collegiate career in 2018 at the University of Wyoming.

Then, McCullough went to the Mackenzie Tour — the Canadian Tour — qualifying school, where he finished 31st.

That gave him conditional status for the first half of the tour, which means he was out on the waiting list, and if the players ahead of him pulled out, he could get in.

McCullough ended up playing nine times on the tour last year, earning one top-10 finish and taking home $9,900.

At this level, McCullough isn’t the only one out there with the same dream.

“The competition is not that much different from what I had in college,” McCullough said. “Pretty much everyone hits the same. It comes down to being good around the greens.”

And, he adds, it’s a much more mental game at this level.

Trying to stay consistent. Having a short-term memory problem, so that if you have a bad hole, you can quickly shake it off and think about the next hole.

He’s preparing to play in the qualifying school again, in March. And the top 14 placers get into the Mackenzie Tour full-time.

“I practice every day. I kind of do everything, but I’ll spend more time putting, or hitting wedges,” he said. “I’m just trying to get better.”

So the victory Friday in the mini-tour, while it didn’t pay much, gave him some more confidence going forward.

“I’ve been working hard for a couple of weeks, so it’s nice to see that work pay off,” he said.

CBC basketball

Got a chance to see the Columbia Basin College men’s and women’s basketball teams twice in three days this weekend over at the Pasco campus.

The Hawks were swept by visiting Yakima Valley on Saturday, and then North Idaho did the same thing Monday.

But there is enough there to see that both CBC coaches — men’s interim head coach Bryan Edwards, and women’s head coach Roosevelt Smith — have the Hawks moving in the right direction.

Against YVC, both the CBC women and men held halftime leads, only to have a cold shooting spell in the second half cause them to lose those leads.

YVC’s men won 88-76, rallying from being down 12 at intermission. But Sergio Pineda looked good for the Hawks, scoring 11 points and grabbing 9 rebounds.

Not once did it look like the Hawks gave up in that battle.

CBC’s women led 39-32 at the half, but the visiting Yaks took advantage of the Hawks cold spell and outscored CBC 20-8 in the third quarter.

Burbank grad Ali Martineau led CBC with 18 points and 10 rebounds.

On Monday, Pineda had 16 points and 6 boards for the CBC men, who just trailed 47-45 to a highly talented North Idaho at intermission.

In the second half, the Cardinals pulled away a bit. But CBC was right there, falling 96-87.

The CBC women fell 60-53 to North Idaho, as Southridge grad Sami Sanders had 11 points and 12 rebounds in the loss.

The CBC men are now 1-5 in East Region play, and 6-12 overall.

The CBC men are 2-4, 5-13 overall.

But here’s the deal: Both teams are only 1.5 games out of a playoff spot with 10 games left on the region schedule.

The top four in the East advance to the postseason.

In the men’s case, North Idaho sits at 6-0/18-1. But the Cardinals are ineligible for post season play after some NWAC violations.

Pasco-Chiawana tripleheader Saturday

Looking for something cool to do Saturday night?

Head over to Pasco High for the annual tripleheader between the Bulldogs and the Chiawana Riverhawks.

At 5 p.m., the varsity girls basketball teams play their second game against each other.

It involves two of the top three teams in the Mid-Columbia Conference.

After that game, the wrestling mat is brought out onto the gym floor as the boys wrestling teams from each school meet in their MCC match.

Both teams are currently undefeated in MCC play — Chiawana at 5-0, Pasco at 4-0 — and both squads have plenty of state tournament-caliber wrestlers who should either win state titles or be in the state championship match next month in Tacoma.

Finally, scheduled for 9 p.m. is the boys varsity basketball game.

Chiawana’s boys are currently 13-0 on the season, while the Bulldogs team is vastly improved from the beginning of the season, and is 2-11.

Blakney playing well

Despite the University of Idaho men’s basketball team record of 5-12, Prosser grad Scott Blakney has been playing well as of late.

The 6-foot-8 junior scored 14 points last Thursday night in a 78-75 loss to Eastern Washington University.

Then on Saturday, Blakney scored 12 points and grabbed 5 rebounds in a 67-63 loss to Montana.

Blakney is currently the Vandals’ third-leading scorer, averaging 9.9 points a game.