Southview cc and Hillcrest gc St. Paul, MN

[Tommy Williamsen]

My son is fresh out of law school and needs a place to play.  He is single digit handicap.  These clubs have reasonable memberships.  Not sure about the courses.  Know anything?

[Jeff Shelman]

Tommy,

Check your messages.

Jeff

[Tommy Williamsen]

Please!

[John_Conley]

Hillcrest is a place to play, but not much more.  John McMorrow shot a then-record low score in winning the State Am there about 25 years ago.

Southview is fair, and probably a good bit better than Hillcrest.  Others to consider may include Midland Hills.

Not sure how the daily-fee options are running on that side of town, but a season pass to Bristol Ridge is quite reasonable and a great value.  There may be others nearer to St. Paul that offer the same.

[Rick Shefchik]

I like Hillcrest very much, but if your son is a young bomber (and who isn't these days?) he might feel too confined there. Hillcrest makes use of doglegs, tight-tree-lined fairways and steeply-sloped elevated greens to defend par, and I think it does so very well. Southview I find more non-descript; if I were chosing one or the other, I'd chose Hillcrest. Your son will surely have a preference after playing them both.

StoneRidge, the Bobby Weed course near Stillwater on I-94, had a pretty reasonable membership offer this year. I think it was somewhere in the neighborhood of $3500. It's public, but it's a beautiful links-style course that would provide a good test for a big hitter.

[Tony Petersen]

  He might also want to check out North Oaks Golf Club in North Oaks (St.Paul). Though it was the first "gated" community in MN, when I played their last summer with the GM (Dick Haugen) they were having a hell of a sale on memberships. I know when I did the math w/ the club financing the initiation, it came to a monthly payment equal to that of a Honda Civic. Fun Stanley Thompson design, good distance, sporty with some driveable 4's, fun 5's and solid 3's. some water, big trees, FAST greens, something you might want to look into

[Dan Kelly]

I've played Southview only once, about five years ago, in a Scramble: Can remember very little about it, really -- possibly my fault as much as the golf course's.

I've played Hillcrest more often, and more recently (four or five times, two and three years ago), and I like it a lot -- particularly the back 9, which opens with a couple of terrific par-4s, then features, among other good holes, two very good par-3s and a wonderful par-5 with a steeply uphill approach and a hillside dotted with bunkers. It was in terrific shape every time I played it. (I don't know anything about the membership. I do know that they built an imposing new clubhouse a few years ago.)

I second Rick's nomination of StoneRidge, if it's convenient to your son.

I like North Oaks a lot, almost from beginning to end.

Two others to consider:

-- Town and Country Club -- a very quirky old course (oldest in Minnesota, I believe), with consecutive par-3s on the front side and closing 5-5-5-3. Lots of fun. Very convenient to downtown Minneapolis and downtown St. Paul. Last I heard, it wasn't at all unspeakably expensive to join.

-- University of Minnesota. $900 a year for U of M alumni -- a category VERY broadly defined, to include all members of the University of Minnesota Alumni Association. (You needn't have ever set foot in a U of M classroom to join the Association.) Rick Shefchik and I played it this summer, and found it in the best shape we'd ever seen it.