STROH's South Texas Roost of Hospitality

The Path to Nationals

Four qualifiers, one Regional, and a four-golfer team headed for Sweetens Cove.

Strip everything else away and the Roost exists for one reason: to field a four-golfer team to compete for a spot in the Roost Club Championship, hosted by No Laying Up at Sweetens Cove Golf Club in Tennessee.

Everything on this site — the qualifiers, the points races, the alternates process — is machinery pointed at that one outcome.

Where the structure came from

The Roost system isn’t something STROH’s invented. It’s NLU’s, and this is how they described it when they sent the original doc round in 2022:

This event will be modeled on the Little League World Series. In 2022, there will be 10 Regions across the US, Canada, and the UK/Continental Europe plus a No Laying Up team. Each Region may have numerous clubs (though we may limit the number in year 1 as we figure out our #process). Each region will host a regional tournament to decide the club that represents that region in the championship, and that club will send a team of 4 to the Championship. Regional representatives must be Nest Members to play in the Championship, but local clubs will not be exclusive to Nest members. Regions will be determined by NLU, geography, AND where Nest Members are located. The Championship will be held in Late August or September of 2022 to give each region time to hold their regional tournaments and figure out their club representatives for the Championship.

That’s the founding text, so the dates in it are 2022’s. Two things in it still govern how we operate, though: a Roost sends a team of four, and the four people on it have to be Nest members. The Roost itself is not Nest-only — you are welcome at STROH’s events regardless — but the Championship team is.

Texahoma

STROH’s is grouped with Big Plex (DFW) and Supercell (Oklahoma) in the Texahoma Region. Our team plays both of them at Roost Regionals in late July or early August, and the winner carries the region to the Roost Club Championship in late October.

Playing in STROH’s events means committing to the qualifiers to the best of your ability — and, if you earn it, to the national tournament later in the year.

The four qualifiers

Four events feed our Roost Regional team, one seat each:

  1. Texas Two-Step — a two-day net “ringer” tournament. Our Major.
  2. All-STROHs Open — a one-day quota tournament.
  3. Muni Tour — a season-long net stroke-play points race, decided by a playoff.
  4. Opn Szn — a season-long match-play tournament, decided by a playoff bracket.

The Texas Cup sits outside this list. It’s our marquee team event against Big Plex, but it isn’t a Roost Regional qualifier — no seat rides on it.

The NIT

Separately — but all sort of related — NLU hosts the Nest Invitational Tournament (NIT) every November. Each Roost designates one of its events as its “Major,” and the winner of that event is the Roost’s NIT qualifier.

Our Major is the Texas Two-Step. Unlike the Regional team seats, the NIT spot is open to any Refuge member who plays the event — you don’t have to be a STROH to take it. The naming rules and the seven-day deadline are on the Executive Committee page.

When someone can’t go

If a qualifier’s winner can’t travel, the runner-up from that event is first alternate, and the Executive Committee hand-picks from there. See The Executive Committee for how and why.

A note on how we compete

Any of us could open a city golf association schedule and find a one-day or two-day stroke-play tournament this weekend. That isn’t what this is. STROH’s is more about getting involved and enjoying the game, and less about grinding on two-footers for double bogey — so we prioritize fun courses, fun formats, and fun side games over pure stroke-play competition.