Credit: Photo credit of UMMC

Golf has been described as a good walk spoiled, but the sport has meant much, much more to Children’s of Mississippi, the state’s only children’s hospital. 

The Sanderson Farms Championship, Mississippi’s only tournament on the PGA Tour, Tuesday presented a $1 million check to Friends of Children’s Hospital from proceeds from the 2022 tournament last fall. Tuesday’s donation brings to $15.7 million the total the golf event has raised for the hospital since Sanderson Farms, now Wayne-Sanderson Farms, became the tournament’s title sponsor in 2013. Century Club Charities, the host organization for Mississippi’s PGA tournament, has raised more than $23 million for statewide charities since 1994.

Children’s of Mississippi, which also includes clinics around the state, treats more than 200,000 children annually. The donation was announced at a news conference at the Kathy and Joe Sanderson Tower on the campus of the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

The 2023 Sanderson Farms Championship will be held Oct. 2-8 at Country Club of Jackson.

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Rick Cleveland, a native of Hattiesburg and resident of Jackson, has been Mississippi Today’s sports columnist since 2016. A graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi with a bachelor’s in journalism, Rick has worked for the Hattiesburg American, Monroe (La.) News Star World, Jackson Daily News and Clarion Ledger as a reporter, editor and columnist.

He was executive director of the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. His work as a syndicated columnist and celebrated sports writer has appeared in numerous magazines, periodicals and newspapers. Rick has authored four books and has been recognized 13 times as Mississippi Sports Writer of the Year.

He was inducted into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame in 2016 and into the Hattiesburg Hall of Fame in 2018. He received the Richard Wright Award for Literary Excellence in 2011 and was inducted into the University of Southern Mississippi Communications Hall of Fame in 2018. In 2000, he was honored with the Distinguished Mississippian Award from Mississippi Press Association. He has received numerous state, regional and national awards for his column writing and reporting.