Xander Schauffele finding new mindset to get winning again

WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W. Va. –  When Doug Ghim and his roommate Maverick McNealy were on the airport shuttle heading to The Greenbrier late last week for new member orientation, they couldn’t help but take stock of their situation. “We joked that I think the best part of the week would be at registration and you could check the box that’s a PGA TOUR professional instead of ‘other’ and getting our credential and all that,â€� Ghim said with a grin. On Thursday, Ghim and McNealy took the next step, along with a host of other new members, who made their presence known at A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier at the Old White TPC. One was the leader, 24-year-old Robby Shelton, who played at Alabama and shot a career-low 62. Another was Scott Harrington, the 38-year-old finally getting his chance to realize his dream, who was tied with four others, including defending champion Kevin Na, for second after 64s. Ghim, who graduated from Texas in 2018, was in a group of 10 players who shot 65s that included his former Longhorn teammate Scottie Scheffler. McNealey was in a big group two strokes behind his Las Vegas roommate while the uber-heralded rookie, Viktor Hovland, shot 68 after a bogey on the last hole. Ghim, who needed a 10-footer that he followed with an uppercut on the final hole of the Korn Ferry Championship to solidify his TOUR card, said the week has been gratifying and humbling at the same time. RELATED: Top 10 rookies to watch | Shelton shoots 8-under 62, leads by two | DeChambeau switches to a new prototype golf ball  “I honestly thought I’d be more nervous,â€� he said. “… I wasn’t really sure what I would be feeling. I’m one of the few that was lucky enough play in a handful of a PGA TOUR events and actually play well in them. “But when you play as a sponsor exemption, you’re kind of playing with nothing to lose really because you’re not a member of the TOUR. Like only good things matter. And like if you played bad, it doesn’t really matter. You just go back to the Korn Ferry Tour. So, I thought maybe I’d be a little bit more nervous because of that fact. “But as soon as I hit my first tee shot, I kind of felt right at home. … I’m just having a blast. It’s everything I would’ve thought it would be. And to play well as I did on the first round was even better. And I just felt like a validating round for anything. And I’m just really, really excited to get this whole season going.â€� Ghim marveled at the perks – his choice of balls to hit on the practice range, courtesy cars, the massive grandstands, dry cleaning, even real eggs in the breakfast buffet. “All those little things add up,â€� he said, smiling. But the biggest thing is the chance to prove himself against the best in the world. “To be a member of the TOUR and know that this is my home now and I’m fighting for the privilege to stay out here and, and hopefully become one of the best is a really cool feeling.â€� Ghim said. “I don’t feel like an outsider anymore and I feel like I belong here, and rounds like today, especially, kind of cement my place here and I’m really excited about the opportunity.â€� Shelton, who finished fourth in the Korn Ferry Tour priority rankings, was playing in his first TOUR event since tying for 67th at the 2017 RBC Canadian Open. He hit his first shot as a TOUR member at 8:45 a.m. Thursday in the company of two other rookies, Tyler McCumber and Kristoffer Ventura. “I’m fired up. Last night it was tough to sleep,â€� said Shelton, who said he was in bed by 9 p.m. “I’ve been waiting for this moment all season. After winning two times on the Korn Ferry I knew it was coming, and just been super excited. It’s finally here. Just celebrate it for the next three days.â€� Like Ghim and many others, Shelton was afforded sponsor exemptions on TOUR. He said he learned a lot in those experiences. “Just trying to tell myself that it’s just golf,â€� he said. “I think my sponsor exemptions and stuff, I thought I had to change my game and try to play with the big boys. Now, I mean, I just know it’s golf. Been through the Mackenzie Tour and the Korn Ferry Tour, so I know what my game has. “And if I can just get to that a lot sooner, that’s the goal.â€� Harrington, on the other hand, took a longer road. He took the 2018 season off to help care for his wife, who was battling Hodgkin’s lymphoma for the second time. With her cancer in remission, he returned to the Korn Ferry Tour this year and earned his card with a second-place finish at the WinCo Portland Open. “I always did think I was going to get here,â€� said Harrington, who played at Northwestern where he was a teammate of former world No. 1 Luke Donald. “My age didn’t really deter me. I felt like I was only progressing. The progressions were small every year, but I was never taking a step back. … “Even though I’m 38 years old, I feel like I’m every bit as capable of winning out here as any 22-year-old. Yeah, age is just a number. I feel like as long as you keep your length up and your health and mentally you’re sound, I know there are great things out there for me.â€�

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The 2021 Australian Open and the 2022 Women’s Australian Open have been cancelled as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to play havoc with international travel plans.

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RIDGELAND, S.C. – Rory McIlroy was not in a waiting mood as he stood fidgeting on the tee at the par-4 15th hole at Congaree Golf Club, site of THE CJ CUP in South Carolina. The hole measures 360 yards but features a deep and rugged bunker that juts into the fairway from the left, and most players prudently lay up short with long irons, as McIlroy’s two fellow competitors already had. Not McIlroy. He stood there looking like Popeye fresh from an all-you-can-eat spinach buffet, until he could stand idly no longer. McIlroy unleashed a mighty swing and launched a moonshot that scoffed at the 320 yards it needed to cover the gaping bunker, his ball then pounding firm turf and scooting between a greenside bunker and a golf bag before finally stopping on the front of the green. The players and caddies on the green weren’t ready for that. Keegan Bradley, playing alongside Thomas and Jon Rahm up ahead, threw both arms over his head, hopefully only in jest at his South Florida neighbor. After the group teed off at 16, McIlroy would walk up and apologize. He was sorry/not sorry. “Yeah, the longer I stood over that tee shot,” McIlroy said, “the more likely it was that I was going to lay up, so I just needed to step up and hit it. Whether they were on the green or not, I had to go.” Had to go. In a larger picture frame, that line seems to capture where it is in the golf universe that McIlroy finds himself at the moment. There are few things in golf as feared as McIlroy when he is armed with a hot driver and a belly filled with confidence. At Congaree on Thursday, where his opening 5-under 66 left him just one shot off the lead, McIlroy had both. He is playing well, he is No. 2 in the world (closing fast on top-ranked Scottie Scheffler), he has momentum on his side, and it is time to go. Time to make his move. Last autumn, McIlroy, 33, was coming off a dismal performance at the Ryder Cup, where the European team’s clear-cut leader had laid an egg, and his team got trounced. He was in tears. Having climbed to No. 1 eight different times in his career – doing so the first time in 2012 – McIlroy had slid to 14th. No-man’s land for him. Frankly, he was lost. So he hit reset and decided to do something about it. His priority? Reclaiming ownership in his own game. Making sure whatever he was doing had his own thumbprint. Never one to stand in one place, McIlroy had chased more speed, a rabbit hole, and listened to advice outside of Michael Bannon, his instructor since his youth in Northern Ireland. McIlroy eventually would move forward by pausing and taking a step back. “I sort of went down a path that I realized wasn’t for me,” McIlroy said. “That was really it, just trying to get back ownership of my game, my golf swing, and being OK with doing it my way. I think that was the big thing.” Thursday, outside of a wild opening tee shot, there was little to fault in his game. He ran off three consecutive birdies starting at Congaree’s par-5 fourth, and he tacked on two more birdies on the back, including an easy two-putt birdie after reaching the green at 15. After he’d driven the green, a tanned marshal on the tee was asked if other players in the field also had been doing that. “Uh-uh,” the marshal said, somewhat shock-like, shaking his head side-to-side. You’d have thought he’d just spotted Sasquatch. Tom Kim, the 20-year-old South Korean who already has two PGA TOUR victories, knows that McIlroy packs plenty of power into a small frame, but it was different to be playing alongside him, and to witness it for 18 holes. “He makes this game look so easy,” said Kim, who was impressive in his own right. (Kim briefly tied the lead when he stuffed a 9-iron inside 2 feet at the par-4 17th, reaching 6 under on his round, but gave the shot back with an errant drive on the final hole.) Kim seemed to think getting to play golf with McIlroy (and Rickie Fowler) was the coolest thing since the new iPhone. It was hard not to be a spectator. At the par-5 12th, for instance, McIlroy smashed a drive around the corner that was 80 yards past Kim’s. “Something you can’t copy, I think,” Kim said of McIlroy’s power. “It was really hard to just kind of play my own game sometimes. Seeing the lines he took, and it was like 380 (yards) to the runout and he was saying, ‘Sit.’ I was like, ‘Really? Like, sit?’ It was like 380, but he almost made it.” McIlroy spent a few days last week in Florida fine-tuning with Bannon, trying to get his right arm to support the club a little better at the top. Swing-wise, he’s in a nice place. And not only does he have the No. 1 world ranking back in view, McIlroy, who became the first two-time winner of the PGA TOUR’s FedExCup in August, can finish in the top spot on the DP World Tour, too. The DP World Tour Championship is Nov. 17-20 in Dubai. Plenty at stake in mid-October? That is a very nice destination. “Maybe if I didn’t have these two things to go for over the next couple of months, I would take a bit of time off, but I still feel motivated,” McIlroy said. “I think playing well motivates you even more also. There’s definitely no lack of that.” Outside of perhaps a dose more patience on that 15th tee on Thursday, Rory McIlroy did not lack for much.

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