21st Annual Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic Raises $1.4 Million For The Toby Keith Foundation And OK Kids Korral

The legacy that Toby Keith left behind continues to make the world a better place.

The 21st edition of the Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic took place May 30-31 at Riverwind Casino and Keith’s Belmar Golf Club in Norman, Oklahoma. The golf tournament and gala always aims to raise money for the OK Kids Korral, which Keith started to help pediatric cancer patients in Oklahoma by providing cost-free living spaces for families of children battling cancer.

This year was actually the 10-year anniversary of the Toby Keith Foundation opening up the OK Kids Korral. Celebrating the decade-long milestone, the Foundation gifted $10,000 in grants to 10 local children’s charities. As for this year’s golf tournament and gala, the event brought in $1.4 million, which means that the annual golf tourney has now raised over $21 million in its 21 years of existence.

Last year’s 20th Anniversary Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic brought in a record $3.1 million.

Sammy Hagar, the rock artist and longtime friend of Toby Keith’s, hosted the Toby Keith & Friends gala, and got things started with a $10,000 donation from the Hagar Family Foundation. That triggered an avalanche of donations, with one attendee offering $25,000 and Keith’s wife, Tricia Covel, pledging another $25,000 donation. Others jumped in, and within the first two minutes of the event, more than $100,000 was raised for the Toby Keith Foundation.

The live and silent auction portion of the Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic typically acts as the event’s biggest money maker, and this year it raised over $600,000 in total. Some of the top bids from the night were:

-Kentucky Derby package that went for $60,000

-A Tuscan Villa experience that sold three times at $40,000 each

-A Toby Keith Limited Edition Military Guitar that sold twice for $35,000

-A George Strait autographed cowboy hat for $7,000

-A Lainey Wilson concert experience that went for $6,800

Sammy Hagar said it was his honor to help out and host the gala event, and that he’d do it again in a heartbeat:

“I had a blast … would be happy to do it again. Toby would’ve done that and more for me any day.”

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The golf tournament itself took place on Saturday, May 31 and was comprised of an impressive 53 teams. With the large amount of teams, the tournament was split into a morning competition and afternoon competition (A Flight & B Flight), and separate winners were recognized for both.

Two teams got to call themselves winners of the scramble golf tournament that day, but the real winner of the weekend was the OK Kids Korral. All of the proceeds from the tournament went to The Toby Keith Foundation, which in turn supports the OK Kids Korral that opened up around eleven years ago.

Toby Keith was quoted with saying that the OK Kids Korral is the “best gift I’ve ever given to the world.” He was awfully excited about opening it up in 2014, and the country music star continued to stay heavily involved with cost-free living center for families with children battling cancer until he passed away in 2024.

You can hear him talk about the origin of the OK Kids Korral in the video below:

The post 21st Annual Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic Raises $1.4 Million For The Toby Keith Foundation And OK Kids Korral first appeared on Whiskey Riff.