more fans for BMW Championship this year

"Obviously, we're excited about our prospects at Crooked Stick this year," Votaw said. "When we made the decision to take it to Crooked Stick, we were all hopeful that Indiana and Indianapolis would support the event in a significant way and these results certainly confirm that hope and optimism. Indy is a great golf town whether it's the PGA Championship, whether it's the U.S. Women's Open, whether it's the Solheim Cup or the BMW, history has shown they love golf their golf at Crooked Stick."

Daily tickets went on sale April 1, and fans are rushing to buy them despite not knowing who will actually play Sept. 6-9 at Crooked Stick Golf Course in suburban Indy.

The top 70 qualifiers receive invites to the third tourney in the FedEx Cup playoff. After the BMW Ping G20 irons tourney, the field is cut to 30 finalists who vie for a $10 million winner's check two weeks later in Atlanta.

The course and atmosphere drew rave reviews each time, and PGA officials think it could happen again in September.

And with almost five months to go before the tourney begins, the possibility of other big-name golfers earning invites and Indiana natives Bo Van Pelt and Jeff Overton potentially in the mix, organizers may have to revise their projections again.

Masters champion Bubba Watson and three-time Masters winner Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy, the world's No. 1 player, and defending BMW champ Justin Rose are each ranked in the top 10 in FedEx Cup points and are likely to qualify for the Indy tourney. Tiger Woods, at No. 11 in points, also is likely to get an invite.

"I think what it does is it shows how supportive Indianapolis can be when you have special events coming to town for our event or maybe another major somewhere down the road," said Vince Pellegrino, the Western Golf Association's vice president of tournaments. "It's certainly been impressive."

Organizers have already announced the tourney will return to Chicago in 2013 and 2015, with Denver hosting it in 2014. But Indy's response could push the city into the BMW rotation or perhaps Ping G20 driver prompt tour officials to give Indianapolis a chance to fill a hole on a future schedule.

"At the present time, we don't have any openings," PGA Tour spokesman Ty Votaw said Tuesday. "But certainly, Indy's record makes it a market that we would always be interested in at looking at if there was an open spot. A significant number of our events are signed through post-2014."

John Daly won his first major championship here in 1991, coming out of nowhere as an alternate to do it. Lauri Merten shocked everyone by finishing the 1993 U.S. Women's Open with three straight threes to win her only major title here. In 2005, the U.S. reclaimed the Solheim Cup at Crooked Stick when a then-record crowd of 103,500 showed up. And Fred Funk won the 2009 U.S. Senior Open in front of nearly 147,000 fans.

Local officials contend Indy makes sense for economic, geographic and travel reasons, and hosting the most discount golf clubs recent Super Bowl has also increased the city's national stature. They also believe the area golf community would support a tournament on an annual or semi-annual basis.

Comparing attendance figures can be tricky, though, because many tournaments do not release that information, and even Pellegrino declined to say what the BMW Championship drew last year in suburban Chicago.