Scottie Scheffler defends title at 2024 Hero World Challenge, earns ninth win of year
NASSAU, Bahamas — Eight wasn’t enough for Scottie Scheffler.
With birdies on three of the first four holes on Sunday, he assumed the lead and cruised to a six-stroke victory over Tom Kim at the 2024 Hero World Challenge for his ninth win of the year.
“It feels nice,” Scheffler said. “I’ve been fortunate to get some wins out of some really good golf. This was another week where I played really solid and was able to see some nice results from that. Overall it was a pretty fun year.”
Was it ever. Scheffler closed with a birdie at the final hole to shoot 9-under 63 at Albany Club, a 72-hole total of 25-under 263 and successfully defend his title at the 20-man unofficial event hosted by Tiger Woods.
“You were in my tummy last time,” Meredith Scheffler told the couple’s first born, son Bennett, who arrived in May and was carried around the course by her mother in a baby carrier.
Scheffler, the world No. 1 and FedEx Cup champion, won seven times on the PGA Tour, including the Masters, Players Championship and Tour Championship. He also won a gold medal at the Paris Olympics, which he counts as win No. 8.
“Gotta enjoy each one, they’re all so unique,” Scheffler’s caddie Ted Scott said. “It’s just good to see him back on the horse.” And he smiled a wry smile before dashing to the airport to catch a flight.
Scheffler opened with 67 and followed with a bogey-free 64 to assume the lead. But he shot a rather pedestrian third-round 69 and trailed Justin Thomas by one stroke heading into the final round. Thomas wedged from 112 yards to 3 feet at the first to protect his one-shot lead. But he made bogeys at Nos. 2 and 5 (and a birdie at three) to lose the lead and never got it back. Scheffler now has shot lower than Thomas, who closed in 71 and finished alone in third, eight of the last nine times they have been paired together.
“I would have liked to put a little more heat obviously on Scottie going to the back nine,” Thomas said. “But I mean, you know, obviously I can’t expect to have good things happen when I’m leading by one over Scottie and only shooting 1 under on Sunday.”
Scheffler stormed out of the gate hot to let it be known he meant business. He drained an 8-foot birdie at the first and reached the par-5 third hole in two and two-putted for another birdie. Then a body blow to the hopes of his competitors at the fourth: He sank a 49-foot birdie putt.
“Anytime you see a long putt go in like that, it’s always a good feeling and it’s good momentum and I try to use that as good fuel for the rest of the round,” he said.
Kim, who closed in 68, cut Scheffler’s lead to one momentarily with a 4-foot birdie at the ninth before Scheffler converted his own 4-foot birdie putt at nine in the next group. He kept the pedal down on the back nine, making birdie at 10 and went flag hunting at 13. He dripped in the 6-foot putt using the claw grip, taking his palm of the right hand off the club, which he used from around 15 feet and in this week for the first time in competition.
“It’s over,” a fan said, perhaps prematurely, but he wasn’t wrong.
Scheffler left little doubt down the stretch, driving the green at the 359-yard par 4 14th for another birdie and adding circles on the card at Nos. 16 and 18.
When it was all said and done, some of the best players were left with nothing else to do but praise his brilliance.
“Sometimes he makes the competition look like he’s just playing around with us, you know what I mean, which isn’t easy to do,” Jason Day said.
To Kim, who often played money games at home in Dallas with Scheffler before the birth of Bennett and noted he lost 95 percent of those matches marveled at how Scheffler never goes out shoots and bad score.
“He comes out here and wins, he does it all the time,” Kim said. “I think the biggest thing that I see is that he’s always trying to get better. Despite winning nine times this year, he’s always finding little ways and I think it’s really, really cool to see and you can take a lot from that.”
Thomas and others echoed a similar sentiment that Scheffler excels at handling all the outside noise – whether it be the birth of his baby or being arrested before his tee time at the PGA Championship or just dealing with expectations he’s supposed to win every time he tees it up. No one has proved better at being able to compartmentalize and stay in his own little bubble.
“I don’t think people understand how difficult it is to win when you’re expected to win or when every single person that’s there expects you to play well and you expect you to play well and then to still play well,” Thomas said. “It truly is just as much of a talent as being able to, you know, control your distance with your wedges or flight a driver or hit it far, whatever it is, is being able to stay present, stay in the moment.
“It’s very hard to explain, but it’s so hard to do sometimes,” Thomas added. “To me that’s been the most impressive thing from Scottie.”
The year 2024 was for Scottie Scheffler, and if his latest putting adjustment is any indication, he’s in for only more success in 2025.
SOURCE: [GolfWeek.USAToday.com]
