I'd be interested to hear the Doak rating on this...
VK:
I went to my review from the 1996 edition of The Confidential Guide, for perspective. [The course got an 8 then, I think I demoted it to a 7 this time, in concert with demoting Long Cove from a 9 to an 8.] Here was my review:
"Harbour Town holds a special place in my heart, because it was the first really good golf course I saw, and it gave an impressionable youth a taste for golf architecture. It is rightly famous among American courses for marking a turning point in the history of golf architecture, away from the Trent Jones school to the Pete Dye school, and there are an enormous number of good strategic holes despite the flattish ground and lack of total length. There is indeed a fine set of short holes, although I do not agree that they are the best set in the world -- they're much too similar.
However, I would be inclined to agree with Pete that the course is somewhat overrated by many critics. The Tour players love it for its tiny greens, which demand precise iron play, but these proved to be less than fuctional at a resort which does 70,000 rounds of golf annually. . . ."
(It used to bother Mr. Dye that so many people thought Harbour Town was his best course. He did not think so, but you can't argue with TV.)
The strategy of Harbour Town is confined to a much narrower space than most other courses we talk about, but it's still there -- there are many holes where you have a shot at the green if you miss the fairway on one side, and no shot if you miss just to the other side.
The genius of it, to me, is how exciting the course looks and plays, considering how flat the ground is. It was routed by George Cobb the same as any of the other courses at Sea Pines Plantation, which were 3's and 4's on the Doak Scale. But Mr. Dye's imagination and craftsmanship made it into something worth seeing and playing.