Tiger Woods undergoes fifth back surgery

AVONDALE, La. – Adam Scott and Jason Day entered this week’s Zurich Classic of New Orleans with high hopes of showing why they should be partners in December at the Presidents Cup in their home country of Australia. Unfortunately, they failed to make the cut. An even-par 72 in the second round of Foursomes play left them at 7 under, one shot outside the cut line when Round 2 finally ended Saturday morning. Two late bogeys – Scott missed a 6-1/2 par putt at the 16th and a 3-footer at the 17th – proved costly. “Just unfortunate that we bogeyed 16 and 17 today,� Day said. “It was hard. There’s no excuses. We did have the tougher side of the draw, but there’s no excuses. “We just needed to come out and play well, and unfortunately I think we just didn’t have the momentum going.� RELATED: Leaderboard | Tee times | How team format works Scott, too, was disappointed, noting that he and Day failed to build on their 7-under 65 in the first round of Four-balls. “The Foursomes format can be tough,� Scott said. “… We missed greens from the fairway and then our short games were under pressure. It’s tough to get a rhythm going, and we were grinding hard and didn’t quite get it going.� Five of the 14 partnerships in which both players represented International Team countries made the cut in a week in which Captain Ernie Els pinpointed as a key building block for his team’s chances against the Americans. Els and fellow South African Trevor Immelman, one of his assistants, did not make the cut. Below is a quick look at how the other 13 teams fared after 36 holes, with each player’s International Team points ranking in parentheses. The top eight in points after the TOUR Championship will automatically qualify for the Presidents Cup, with Els making four Captain’s Picks at a date closer to the December event. MADE CUT JUSTIN HARDING (7)/BRANDEN GRACE (15) – The South Africans followed up their 65 in Four-balls with a 4-under 68 in Foursomes, leaving them at 11 under, three shots off the lead. That’s the highest position of any International duo entering the third round. COREY CONNERS (12)/MACKENZIE HUGHES (79) – The Canadians had a roller-coaster second round with eight birdies and four bogeys, with their 68 moving them to 9 under. SHUBHANKAR SHARMA (T-80)/ANIRBAN LAHIRI (172) – The duo from India made two birdies in their last five holes to sneak inside the cutline at 8 under, including Sharma’s 13-footer at the fifth hole. SUNGJAE IM (13)/WHEE KIM (245) – Kim converted birdie opportunities that Im set up with his irons, and the South Korean duo survived a double-bogey at the 17th to shoot 72 and 8 under through two rounds. JULIAN ETULAIN (128)/ANDRES ROMERO (288) – Although neither is close to competing for a 2019 Presidents Cup spot, they showed some mettle with birdies on two of their last three holes to make the cut with a 3-under 69. MISSED CUT JASON DAY (6)/ADAM SCOTT (11) – Those two late bogeys were painful in their even-par 72. LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN (2)/CHARL SCHWARTZEL (72) – The South African veterans started their Foursomes round with lost balls on consecutive tee shots en route to a quintuple bogey 9. Their 6-over 78 tied for the worst score of the second round. ABRAHAM ANCER (9)/JHONATTAN VEGAS (23) – Ancer (Mexico) just missed on a 21-foot eagle putt at the 18th that would’ve made the cut. Shot 2-under 70 in the second round.. SI WOO KIM (10)/SANGMOON BAE (73) – The South Koreans struggled in the middle of their round, dropping five shots in a six-hole stretch. DANNY LEE (25)/SUNG KANG (35) – Ended the second round with two birdies but their 72 wasn’t enough. DYLAN FRITTELLI (43)/JOAQUIN NIEMANN (117) – An early double-bogey and a seven-hole stretch with five bogeys sealed their fate. CARLOS ORTIZ (71)/SEBASTIAN MUNOZ (146) – Shot a pair of 71s but played better in Foursomes than Four-balls. JOHN SENDEN (T-255)/ROD PAMPLING (T-440) – The veterans from Australia aren’t in consideration for Presidents Cup spots, but they finished strong with four second-nine birdies in shooting 70.

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JERSEY CITY, N.J. – Is this the greatest U.S. golf team ever assembled? Answering that question requires comparing the present to the past. It’s also missing the point. The focus on this week’s outcome at Liberty National, in which the Americans dominated the Internationals so thoroughly that Sunday’s Singles were essentially rendered obsolete, should be spun toward the future. The question is not how good they are, but how much better they can be. Thanks to a nucleus of 20-something stars, a dynamic chemistry, well-timed and collective form, and a leadership group that finally found a winning and sustainable playbook, the U.S. has become, in Nick Price’s words, “a juggernaut.â€� It played out to a 19-11 win, the most lopsided in Presidents Cup history in 17 years. After three stints as the International Captain, Price doesn’t plan to return for a fourth at Royal Melbourne in 2019. That means he’s no longer the primary person tasked with figuring out how to beat the Americans. That will be left up to guys such as Ernie Els and Geoff Ogilvy, assistants this year who are being groomed for future captaincies. It also will be left up to their European Ryder Cup counterparts, who no doubt received the Americans’ message loud and clear this week: We’re here and we’re ready to conquer the world, starting with Paris and Melbourne the next two years. The Americans, in fact, were already letting their minds drift toward the future even before the completion of this week’s event. Thanks to the commanding 11-point lead built after Saturday’s two team sessions, they arrived at Liberty National on Sunday needing just one point from the 12 Singles matches. Phil Mickelson called it a “stress-free day for us – and that’s just something we’ve never had.â€� By the conclusion of the fourth match – Daniel Berger’s 2 and 1 win over Si Woo Kim – they had clinched. “We kind of knew the inevitable was going to happen today,â€� said Jordan Spieth, “You start to kind of look forward and wonder where this momentum could take us.â€� Far would likely be the operative word here. Consider that Spieth, Berger and Justin Thomas are just 24 years old, born within four months of each other in 1993. Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed are 27. Rickie Fowler is 29. Provided there are no health injuries and backsteps in their progress, there’s half your American team for the next decade or so. And of course, that doesn’t include the world’s top-ranked player, Dustin Johnson, who’s 33 and in the early stages of his prime. But it’s not just their age, it’s their attitude. As hard as they compete against each other, they pull for each other even more so. It’s why Spieth was among the first to congratulate Thomas on his PGA Championship win two months ago. It’s why Thomas and Fowler were among those waiting patiently until Spieth was done with his lengthy photo obligations following his Open Championship win. It’s why they vacation together. It’s camaraderie, millennial style. “These guys are famous for traveling together and having fun together,â€� said U.S. assistant Davis Love III, who led the Americans to the Ryder Cup victory last year – the first by the U.S. in eight years. “But the thing is they support each other so much. And that was a big message the last couple teams. Get together, support each other and don’t listen to the outside noise — because they talk about the Americans that they don’t care or that they don’t try. “You see these guys in the team room or working hard on the golf course, they’re trying sometimes too hard. And I think they finally figured out how to relax and play. It showed the first couple of days here that they just came out guns blazing. That feeling spilled over to their U.S. teammates – especially the older ones. “We have a dynamic here that is different than I’ve seen,â€� said the 47-year-old Mickelson, making his 23rd U.S. team appearance this week. “These young guys are not only great players, fiercely competitive, but they have a quality that’s taken me decades to acquire — and that is they are genuinely happy for each other’s success. “That type of support amongst each other, even though they are competing against each other, brings about a really special energy and dynamic to this team. I’ve never been a part of a team all these years that’s this talented and gone out and lit the course up like this. … It’s that support from each other that is getting the best out of them because there is no other way to explain this type of performance.â€� It helps, of course, that practically each American seemed to be at or near the top of his game coming into Liberty National. Johnson and Thomas had won FedExCup Playoffs events. Spieth had top 10s in all four events; Matt Kuchar had three. Fowler had a runner-up in Chicago; Kevin Kisner tied for third in Atlanta. Mickelson, Reed, Kevin Chappell and Charley Hoffman each had at least one top-10 in their last six starts. “The timing of their form,â€� noted Els,â€� has been exceptional. And then you look at their talent on the team, it’s pretty exceptional, too.â€� Eleven of the 12 Americans reached the TOUR Championship. If you weren’t aware of that fact – or the identity of the lone hold-out – then Kuchar made it widely known during Sunday’s post-victory team news conference. “Everybody was on great form,â€� Kuchar said. “We had 11 guys in the TOUR Championship; everybody except Phil Mickelson was at East Lake.â€� Before we go any further, it’s important to know that Kuchar was sitting within arm’s length of Mickelson. You should also know that Kuchar may have consumed some victory champagne or other celebratory beverages. “It was like, how many times does it happen that you get 11 out of 12,â€� Kuchar continued. “If it was only for Phil, we would have had 12 of 12, but Phil was not there. So we were one guy short of having an entire team there and if Phil was there, that would have been the whole team. Like how many times does a team ever have that many guys play that well to make the TOUR Championship?â€� It wasn’t just form, though. It was an incredibly display of big shots, whether holing out from the bunker or rolling in lengthy putts. The Internationals actually played well in the early part of most matches this week, but the Americans were able to turn so many of them down the stretch. U.S. assistant Tiger Woods, who knows a thing or two about the big moments, was impressed with his team’s work on the greens. “I think this was one of the best putting teams I’ve ever seen,â€� Woods said. “I know that they are young, they are talented, hit the ball a long way, but in the end, look at how many more putts we made. Probably from 15 to 18, it was pretty impressive to watch.â€� In the end, the Internationals had no chance. It was the perfect storm, a confluence of variables that worked in the Americans’ favor. Now the challenge is to make sure it’s sustainable. Youth is definitely on the Americans’ side. Chemistry, always a delicate thing, doesn’t seem to be a problem at the moment. But now they wear the target. The Internationals will spend the next two years working on a response. Before that, the Americans have a date in Paris next year; it’s been 25 years since they’ve won on European soil. The best golf team America’s ever assembled? Argue if you must. But you get the feeling their story is just beginning.

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