Gillis recalls time spent in Conway

Tom Gillis, who will graduate Sunday from the Nationwide Tour to the PGA Tour based on a finish inside the top 25 on the season-ending money list, spent two years at Coastal Carolina in 1989 and '90. He played a year on the golf team, which at the time played an unambitious schedule and didn't have particularly impressive finishes despite its weakness. Yet Gillis saw the potential in the program that 10-year coach Allen Terrell has realized, with an annual top-25 national ranking and four All-Americans on the roster in the past four years.
``I said when I first got there we should be a top-20 program,'' Gillis said Saturday at the Nationwide Tour Championship at Daniel Island Club. ``I said, `We have 100 golf courses to play. Who wouldn't want to come here? You could play any golf course. We can go putt on bentgrass if we're playing on bent that week, we can putt on Bermuda. We have endless opportunities.' ''
The Michigan native and resident was recruited from Oakland Community College in the Detroit area by then CCU coach Billy Bernier while playing a tournament in Arizona. ``I was there such a short time,'' Gillis said. `` . . . I just kind of came and went. I don't really have ties to the program.''
Gillis wasn't enamored with the program in his time spent on the Conway campus. ``When I was there it just wasn't a very good program,'' he said. ``We did a lot to try to raise money and they wanted to share the money with every other sports program. I just wasn't happy with a lot there at the time. I busted my [butt] to make it better and nobody wanted to make it better, and it used to [make me mad].''
Gillis remains friends with TPC of Myrtle Beach owner Chip Smith, who has given the CCU program its own practice facility on the back end of the driving range. After Gillis left CCU he returned to the Strand from time to time to practice at Prestwick Country Club, which Smith formerly was marketing at the time.
``He keeps trying to get me down there to the TPC,'' Gillis said. ``I haven't been up to the beach in probably eight years. It's not that I don't want to, I just haven't got around the area that much. . . . When I do I'll definitely stop in and see him.''
He envisions taking part in a CCU-related event at some point. ``Eventually I probably will do a little bit,'' he said.