A little good news came to Southern California golf fans and the LPGA this week, especially the Kraft Nabisco Championship.

It looks like the LPGA will have at least one U.S.-based event before the Kraft Nabisco in 2010, and that event will be played sometime in March at La Costa Resort in Carlsbad.

The new tournament marks several important steps for the LPGA. First, it means the tour will have stops in the San Diego area in consecutive years. The Samsung World Championship was played at Torrey Pines in September, but the future of that tournament is in limbo now that Samsung has withdrawn its sponsorship.

Second, it means the LPGA will keep a promise of a second spring event in Southern California, even if the original promise was to bring a tournament to Los Angeles. Apparently, the LPGA was unable to strike a deal with a suitable golf course, even with a sponsor, J Golf of Korea, already signed.

It also means professional golf is returning to La Costa, a long-time stronghold of golf in Southern California. But the pro game has been gone from La Costa since the Accenture Match Play Championship moved to Arizona three years ago.

But why is this good news for the Kraft Nabisco, entering its 39th year at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage? Because it means the Kraft Nabisco won't be just an island unto itself on the LPGA schedule this spring.

Golf is not NASCAR

As the LPGA has been piecing together a schedule for next year, it was starting to look more and more like the Kraft Nabisco would be a lonely major. Both events in Hawaii played before the Kraft in 2009 are gone. The Singapore event was in question, a tournament in Mexico seems up in the air and the event in Phoenix lost Safeway as a sponsor and seems questionable at best.

Starting a season with a major event might be a good idea for NASCAR and the Daytona 500, but it's not so good for golf. A major needs a little build-up from other events, just to see who's hot or how the game's best players are faring coming into the first big event of the year. Imagine what the golf year on the men's side would look like if the Masters kicked off the season.

Now, the LPGA has a three-year renewal from HSBC for the Singapore event and a deal in place to play at La Costa. Not only does that put the women on a strong golf course that has a history of men's events, but it gives Southern Californians a chance to get a look at the LPGA before the tour comes to Rancho Mirage.

Clearly, there is more work to do for the LPGA when it comes to its spring schedule. In a perfect world there would be at least one Hawaiian event, one event in Arizona and a Southern California event before the Kraft Nabisco.

But this is far from a perfect world these days. Having events before the Kraft, even if one of those events is in Singapore, is far better than having no events before the Kraft. That wasn't such a far-fetched idea just a few weeks ago.

La Costa will be a good site for the LPGA, and the LPGA will be good for La Costa to revive its professional golf tradition. And that marriage is also good for the Kraft Nabisco, which doesn't have to feel like an orphan now.

Larry Bohannan covers golf for The Desert Sun. His columns appear Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. He can be reached at (760) 778-4633.