No Small feat: Seven straight Illinois PGA crowns

The numbers are downright staggering.

Seven straight Illinois PGA Championships.

Eight of the last nine, for that matter.

If not for a playoff loss at the Illinois Open in July, it could have been the fourth Open-PGA sweep for University of Illinois golf coach Mike Small (9 under), who continued his domination by rolling to a 6-stroke victory Wednesday over Jim Sobb of Ivanhoe Club in the 87th Illinois PGA at Stonewall Orchard Golf Club in Grayslake.

For his fellow PGA club professionals, Small's big play has got to be getting old, right?

"Oh no," Sobb said. "When you have the best club professional in the country playing in your section and you're competing against him ... I think that's the ultimate."

And for Small, who has played occasionally - and pretty well, thank you - on the PGA Tour, winning the Illinois PGA Championship is still the ultimate.

"This is the biggest deal to PGA pros," Small said. "I just enjoy coming up here and playing with the guys and seeing my fellow PGA pros and competing with them. That's fun. That's why we all do it. We're all in these things together."

In a round where he admittedly didn't putt too well, Small, thanks to his 5-stroke advantage to start the day, was able to cruise a little Wednesday en route to win No. 8.

"It's tough to make up 5 strokes on Mike," Sobb said. "It's like spotting Secretariat 10 lengths."

Bryan Luedtke of the Sugar Grove Golf Center finished third at 2-under, followed by Marty Schiene of the Odyssey Golf Club (1-under) and PGA Life Member Mike Harrigan at even par.

Just seeing Sobb back out and competing after back spasms forced him to pull out of the last round of the Illinois Open and caused him to withdraw for the following week's U.S. Senior Open, made his strong runner-up finish Wednesday all the more impressive.

"It was good," Sobb said. "(The back) is just something that comes and goes. You get the flare-ups every now and again but you take the good with the bad.

"And finishing runner-up to Mike is fine. I almost feel like I won."