NEW ORLEANS -- Michelle Bordelon of River Ridge, La., stood on a hill behind the ninth green at English Turn Golf and Country Club on Saturday, watching intently as the twosome of Larry Mize and Neal Lancaster attempted to shave a stroke off par in the third round of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans.

Bordelon, a golf fan who assists New Orleans fitness guru Mackie Shilstone for her day job, was making her annual weekend pilgrimage to see the world's best golfers practice their craft. And she obviously was enjoying it. But she was quick to point out that the 2006 version of the PGA TOUR'S annual pit stop in the Crescent City held a little more importance than in years past. The golf tournament, she said, played an integral part of the New Orleans area's recovery from the devastation from Hurricane Katrina.

"The city needs things like this and the Jazz Fest (a celebration of music, food and crafts going on simultaneously at the Fair Grounds),'' she said. "It defines who we are as a community and that we are determined to come back.''

Bordelon also had another poignant point to make about the effort it took to move the event from storm-damaged TPC of Louisiana back to English Turn, which played host to the event from 1989 to 2004.

"I'm really happy English Turn stepped up to the plate,'' she said. "It just shows what can be done when there is a spirit of cooperation among people. Everyone involved showed a lot of resolve to get this done and have the tournament. I think there's a lesson here for our politicians about how things can come together when people work together.''

Robert Ezell and his wife Jenny stood not far from Bordelon on the right side of the ninth green. The Slidell, La., couple had come to see some golf certainly, but the day in the great outdoors provided a respite from what seemed like non-stop work since Katrina blew through the area on Aug. 29, 2005.

"This is the first Saturday I've taken off since the storm,'' Robert Ezell said. "I've been working six and seven days a week. And on the Sundays I've taken off, I've been fixing up the house.''

Unlike many in the area, the Ezells had no water damage in their home, but his family lost two others to seven feet of floodwater. The couple did not escape however. A number of trees crashed into their house, creating more than enough repair headaches.

"But we're here and we're all alive,'' Robert Ezell said. "And we're happy to be out here relaxing.'' Christina Martinez was at English Turn this week for another reason. She was working as a volunteer for the first time.

"I read in the newspaper where there were a lot of big name players coming to New Orleans to help out,'' said Martinez, who lost her job as a school teacher in the St. Bernard Parish School system after the storm dealt that low-lying parish south of New Orleans a particularly severe blow. "Right next to that story was one that said the tournament was short on volunteers.

"So I thought if the players were making an effort to support us, I wanted to support the tournament and the city as well.''

Betsy Plumb could be found lounging on a grassy hill near the first tee. Plumb, 26, a historian at New Orleans' D-Day Museum, was attending her first PGA TOUR event despite fitting the Jazz Fest demographics to a T.

"I'm a bigger golf fan than a Jazz Fest fan,'' she said. "And I don't care much for mud and dust (at the Fair Grounds). Count me as one who is glad the tournament came back and I wish the PGA TOUR played other events closer to New Orleans. But it is nice to see the players and the people here, supporting the city.''

The Zurich Classic and the Jazz Fest weren't the only events that captured the attention of New Orleanians.

Saturday marked the first day of the NFL Draft. With the New Orleans Saints selecting second, a huge roar went up at 11:25 CT when the Saints picked Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush from USC.

"Man, I can believe all the people out here with all that's going on today,'' said Ronnie Lala, as he and several hundred others watched the draft proceedings on the tournament's Jumbotron near the clubhouse. "I went to the Jazz Fest yesterday and I'm here today. I spoke to a ton of people from out of town out there yesterday and a lot of them said they were going to come out here too. This is just great for the city and goodness knows we need good things to happen.''

In that sense, the Zurich Classic was a good thing, giving New Orleanians a little shelter from the reconstruction after a deadly storm and ensuing flood. People from the region showed they cared by attending in numbers that matched those when the tournament last was at English Turn, no small feat considering how much of the area's population has yet to return.

"Considering what everyone in this community has been through and continues to go through this tells me how much this city loves its golf,'' tournament director John Subers said Saturday. "It tells me all the work we did keeping the tournament going was the right thing to do. It says so much about the cooperation between the Fore!Kids Foundation, English Turn and the PGA TOUR. It is very, very satisfying.''