Sand Valley Golf Resort is no stranger to spectacular encores. After the central Wisconsin haven of firm-and-fast, strategic golf raked in awards in 2017 for its Bill Coore-Ben Crenshaw design, it replicated the feat—twice—in 2018. David McLay Kidd’s Mammoth Dunes was honored for Sand Valley that year, and the resort’s 17-hole par-3 layout, the Sandbox, captured Golf Magazine's first prize as Best New Short Course of 2018. Tom Doak made it four-of-a-kind in 2023 with the Lido and repeated in 2024 with Sedge Valley. Would Sand Valley finally decide to rest on its many laurels? Not a chance. Here comes the Commons.
Set on a former driving range between the main resort buildings and the burgeoning Sedge Valley community, the Commons is a 12-hole layout that showcases the design skills of Jim Craig. Casual architecture fans might flash a quizzical look at that name, but those in the know, know that no one has a grasp of Sand Valley like Jim Craig.
Currently under construction on what will be his first solo design, Craig began building at Sand Valley back in 2014, when he and Troy Russell led the Coore-Crenshaw team in the rough grading process, carving out green sites for the resort’s original course, which opened in 2017. Craig then was lead associate when Coore-Crenshaw created the Sandbox par-3 course. That gave Sand Valley domos Michael and Chris Keiser—sons of Bandon Dunes founder Mike Keiser—the idea for the Commons.
“Chris and I started with an observation on the popularity of the Sandbox,” said Michael Keiser to his parent company’s in-house publication, Dream Golf. “We wanted to add another ‘afternoon’ course. In fact, that was the original idea for Sedge Valley, until Tom Doak came back with such a wonderful routing that we built a full 18-hole course. So the idea for the Commons basically grew out of that desire to add alternative golf in addition to the Sandbox.”
As a refresher, Sand Valley occupies remarkable terrain for golf. The resort community is situated on an enormous natural sand deposit in Nekoosa, near the town of Rome, just south of Wisconsin Rapids in the center of the state. Dunes and ridges up to 60 feet high sprawl in every direction. Every red-blooded architect on earth dreams of such a starting point to craft outstanding golf.
“It is a blessing to work with sand,” said original Sand Valley architect Bill Coore. “A golf course built on sandy soil is going to have good drainage and firm turf. For the designer, it’s ideal—you can mold it and shape it exactly as you want.”
For Michael Keiser, the Commons’s sand base is wonderful and the design is expected to be superb, but he’s equally enthusiastic for the purpose the course will serve—as an open space that will enjoin the original resort hub to the new Sedge Valley community, one that incorporates golf, tennis, a neighborhood and Luna Lake. Residents and guests will be able to meander past golf and golfers as they make their way between the two main focal points of resort activity.
“I’ve always loved the idea of a golf park,” said Keiser. “I spent two months in Scotland with my family, and we fell in love with the village greens in places like North Berwick, with the West Links and its Children’s Course, and Meadows Park in Edinburgh, which has Bruntsfield Links. The most famous of all golf parks, of course, is the Old Course at St. Andrews which serves as a family park on Sundays. At all these places, you can find families picnicking, dogs running around, just people enjoying being together and being close to golf.”
In Jim Craig, who friends and close associates call “Jimmy,” Keiser has found the ideal collaborator. As a longtime Sand Valley insider told Sports Illustrated, “Jimmy Craig is a wizard of integrated shaping. It’s not just about creating dramatic features—that’s easy. It’s about creating holes that feel like they’ve always been there. Jimmy’s shaping provides drama, but in a way that just feels natural. That’s a lot more difficult than the end result makes it seem.”
The golf course will open with a par-5 that rambles across boldly undulating ground. What follows are seven par-4s and a quartet of par-3s, but don’t expect shot demands that emulate Oakmont or Bethpage Black. The two-shot holes will be shortish, strategic and at times whimsical—in short, pure fun. Craig and Keiser had nearly completed the course routing when late in 2024, Craig received what he called his “Christmas present”—a lake peninsula that had been initially intended for residential use.
“We had spent about a year planning this walkable, Scottish-style neighborhood on the peninsula,” said Keiser. “But all the planning had been on paper. Once we finished clearing the trees and digging the lake, I went out to see how the peninsula looked, and it was obvious that it looked perfect for golf.”
In Bandon Dunes’s embryonic stage, it unfolded with the mantra, “it was all about the golf.” Young Keiser took that to heart in Wisconsin by slotting golf holes on the peninsula. “Michael gets big ups for that,” Craig told Dream Golf. “That land makes the Commons what it is today. It’s a journey to the water and then back to the golf park. The peninsula was just there, and our job was to embrace it for golf.”
Keiser wasn’t completely sold. “My fear was that the water holes would feel disjointed or out of place with the rest of the course,” he said. “That’s when it pays off to have Jim Craig—he came through with links holes that have water on them. The continuity is never broken, and after two risk-reward par-4s playing around the lake, Jim crafted one of the most engaging Redan holes in the world.”
The Commons will open in the spring of 2026, on or close to the resort’s opening day. Expect Jimmy Craig—and the Keisers—to hit it out of the park.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Sand Valley’s Legacy Grows With the Commons, an ‘Afternoon’ Golf Alternative.
