Serket Golf Club in Seven Hills, Henderson: What's Changed

Drive past the clubhouse on Grand Hills Drive and the sign that used to read Rio Secco now carries a scorpion. If you've lived in Seven Hills for more than a year, you've probably done a double take at that gate at least once since last fall, wondering whether you're still looking at the same course your neighbors have played for two decades, or whether something changed hands while you weren't watching.

Something did change. Just not the thing most people assume.

The Rebrand Everyone Noticed, and the Ownership Behind It

Rio Secco closed for a stretch in the summer of 2025, and when it reopened on September 20, it came back as Serket, pronounced SIR-ket. The name comes from Serket, the ancient Egyptian goddess associated with protection and healing, and the scorpion on the new signage and scorecards is her emblem. Cabot, the company managing the property, framed the change as a way to give the course an identity that matched its Mojave Desert setting rather than a name tied to its old Rio hotel-casino origins.

Here's the part that actually matters if you live three streets from the 10th tee: the land and the golf assets didn't change hands. VICI Properties still owns the course, the same way it has since Vici spun off from Caesars Entertainment in 2017. What changed is who runs day-to-day operations, and that shift happened three years before the name did. Cabot took over management of Rio Secco and Vici's other golf properties under a 20-year agreement back in 2022. The rebrand to Serket in 2025 was the visible result of an operating relationship that had already been in place for a while, not a new ownership story.

That distinction is worth sitting with for a second, because it explains almost everything else that's different about the course this year.

What the New Sign Didn't Touch

If you played this course under its old name, you'd still recognize every hole. Rees Jones designed the layout in 1997, and the routing that's made it a fixture of the Seven Hills skyline hasn't moved: six holes cut through steep canyons, six sit on a plateau with views back toward the Strip, and six more wind through a broad desert wash. Jones came back in 2017 to soften a few of the greens and rework some bunkering, but that renovation predates the current rebrand by eight years and has nothing to do with it.

The Butch Harmon School of Golf, one of the more recognizable teaching operations in the country, still operates on site under the new name. So does Janelas Restaurant and Bar, the clubhouse's 19th hole, still serving the same American menu of salads, burgers, and breakfast plates it did as Rio Secco's dining room. The course still hosts the annual Tiger Woods Jam and other charity events that have run there for years, and Cabot has said that programming continues under Serket without interruption.

So the golf, the instruction, the food, and the charity calendar all carried over intact. What moved was the business behind the counter.

Why a Business Would Change a Name Its Own Neighbors Already Loved

For two decades, this course operated as a Caesars-era resort amenity, the kind of property that answers to hotel occupancy numbers and comped play for casino guests. Cabot runs a different kind of operation. It's a golf-first developer with residential and resort properties, and its stated approach is to market its courses as standalone destinations rather than perks attached to a casino floor. That's a different business model, and different business models tend to show up in pricing.

One theory that's made the rounds among regular players, relayed by a longtime area golfer who says he asked the head pro directly, is that the switch had something to do with a licensing fee tied to the old Rio Secco name going up, and Cabot deciding it made more sense to rebrand than to keep paying it. Nobody at Cabot has confirmed that publicly, so treat it as local color rather than settled fact, but it fits the pattern of everything else about this transition: quiet, operational, and mostly invisible unless you're the one booking tee times.

And if you are the one booking tee times, here's what you'll actually notice:

1. Pricing is now dynamic, meaning rates climb the closer you get to your play date, so booking early gets you the better number.
2. The course is being packaged more explicitly with its sister property, Cascata, on the same booking calendar, with twilight and multi-course rates showing up more often than they did under the old Caesars booking flow.
3. Tee times remain bookable up to 120 days out, giving locals plenty of runway to plan around the new pricing rhythm instead of getting caught by a last-minute jump.

Rates split fairly cleanly by season. Off-season play, which runs roughly June through August and mid-November through January, tends to fall in the lower range. Peak season, covering February through May and September through mid-November, carries the higher end. If you've been booking the same way you did five years ago and wondering why your usual Saturday tee time costs more than it used to, this is why.

The Name Change Isn't the Story. The Operator Change Is.

It's easy to read a new logo and assume a course got a facelift or, worse, that ownership sold and the character of the place is about to shift. Neither happened here. The course Rees Jones built is still the course you're playing. The instructors at Butch Harmon's school are still teaching the same swing fundamentals. Janelas is still pouring the same drinks after your round.

What actually changed is how the business behind the counter thinks about the property, and that shows up in smaller, more practical ways: a pricing model that rewards early booking, a marketing push that leans harder into the Cascata pairing, and a brand identity built around a scorpion instead of a river that never really flowed through the Black Mountains anyway.

For a neighborhood where a good share of daily life still orbits this course, whether that's an early tee time before the heat sets in or a post-round plate at Janelas with the same neighbors you've been playing with for years, the practical reality is that almost nothing about your routine needs to change. Book a little earlier than you used to. Say Serket instead of Rio Secco when someone asks where you played, even if it takes a few tries to get the pronunciation to stick. The course under the new name is doing exactly what it's always done: giving Seven Hills a green space, a view of the Strip from the plateau holes, and a reason for a lot of people who've never met each other to nod hello on the same fairway.

That's the part worth knowing before the next person at a barbecue asks whether "the golf course changed" and you have to decide how much of the story to tell.

If you're weighing a move in or around Seven Hills and want a read on how a community this established actually functions day to day, from the golf course to the parks to the pace of the market, Mary Jay Yusuf has spent years working these Henderson neighborhoods and can walk you through what's really changed and what hasn't. Schedule Your Consultation to talk through your next move.