Warren Stephens' acceptance speech into the Arkansas State Golf Association Hall of Fame ran a little longer than initially planned Thursday night at Chenal Country Club.
When his focus turned to legendary golfer Arnold Palmer, Stephens had the sold-out crowd of 350 thoroughly engaged on an evening when the state's top players were honored, and Jack O'Keefe and Julie Oxendine were enshrined into the ASGA Hall.
Stephens, the chairman, president and CEO of Stephens Inc., said after going back and forth with representatives of the Arnold Palmer Cup, a call from the golfer a couple of weeks before his Sept. 25 death sold him on his Alotian Club hosting the top international collegiate tournament June 7-9, 2019.
"Mr. Palmer called and asked me if the Alotian would do it," said Stephens, the founder of the club that is located in western Pulaski County and played host to the 2013 Western Amateur. "What do you say to that? You say, yes. I told him what you've done for golf, and what you've done being nice to me and the friendship with Dad, the answer is yes."
Stephens' father, Jackson T. Stephens, was the chairman from 1991-98 of Augusta National Golf Club, which hosts the Masters, the tournament Palmer won four times.
"He came to the Jackson T. Stephens charitable tournament the second year, and we rode around," Stephens said. "He looked around and just said, 'This is great.' I think in the back of his mind he thought this was a good place. He didn't mention anything about Dad, but that has to be a part of it. They were good friends."
The 2017 Palmer Cup is the 20th anniversary of the matches and will be held at Atlanta Athletic Club. In 2018, the format will change to add 12 women to the 12 men currently on each side, plus the European team will be replaced by an international team for all collegiate players with citizenship outside the United States.
"Arnold was thrilled to come here a few years past," said Alastair Johnston, CEO of Arnold Palmer Enterprises and Palmer's business manager the past 35 years. "He was always intrigued about The Alotian Club because it reminded him somewhat of Augusta as well as some of the venues where we've played the Palmer Cup before.
"The irony of all of this is Arnold was so delighted in getting Warren to commit to this, and in retrospect it was the last big decision he engineered."
A total of 47 former Palmer Cup players have a combined 170 victories on the PGA or European tours, including Conway's Bryce Molder. There also have been 22 former U.S. and European Ryder Cup team members in the event.
"I didn't realize before that, this has become a who's who of future professional golfers," Stephens said. "There were seven people from the Arnold Palmer Cup to play in the last Ryder Cup at Hazeltine.
"It's going to be a big honor for us. The list of clubs that have hosted it before is really impressive -- Baltusrol, St. Andrews -- and to have our club listed with those and to host it in 2019, it's going to be a special event."
Sports on 11/04/2016