DUBLIN, Ohio (AP) — Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler took a detour to Shinnecock Hills on their way to the Memorial and saw fairways a lot wider than what they have come to expect at a U.S. Open.
The U.S. Open returns to Shinnecock Hills for the first time since 2018, when Brooks Koepka won during a tough, dry week in which no one finished under par.
Scheffler had never been to the fabled course on New York’s Long Island, which held the second edition of the U.S. Open in 1896. This major is bigger than usual for the world’s No. 1 player because a victory would make him only the seventh player to complete the career Grand Slam.
“It was kind of what I expected,” Scheffler said. “I had heard some rumors about how difficult the greens were. I was a little surprised at the width of the fairways, but the green complexes there are extremely difficult, and I think that’s where the greatest challenge comes from.”
He also said the rough was thick and penal. That’s typical of a U.S. Open. A vintage U.S. Open has firm greens, and that looks to be the case, provided the weather cooperates.
Narrow fairways? Not so much.
“The fairways are very generous,” said McIlroy, who missed the cut with rounds of 80-70 when he first played a U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills. “They’re more generous than they were in 2018. But the first cut of rough is 5 inches long. So it’s like the first cut is maybe three paces wide and then it gets into the fescue.
“So if you miss the fairway even by a yard … but you shouldn’t. The fairways are very, very generous. So if you miss the fairway, I feel like you deserve a bad lie.”
It will be a big week for the USGA to get it right. In 2004, the par-3 seventh green was so dead on Sunday that players couldn’t keep the golf ball on the putting surface and USGA officials wound up watering the green between groups.
Then in 2018, some of the greens became so severe that it was thought to be borderline unplayable. Phil Mickelson swatted a moving golf ball on the 13th green out of frustration. Officials softened the course so much for the final day that Tommy Fleetwood shot 63.
The course has a reputation of being tough, and Scheffler felt it lived up to that.
“The rough, also, was a really good penalty for the width,” he said. “Once you start missing fairways out there, you have no chance. But the fairways are generous enough to where it provides you some opportunity, and that way it’s just that the green complexes are extraordinarily difficult.
“They can put the pins wherever they want and make the scores as high as they could possibly want them to be.”
McIlroy said the greens were around 11 on the Stimpmeter when he played on Monday and he doesn’t see a need for them to get much faster.
“I think if they can keep them at that green speed, they can get them firm, and they can use the hole locations that they want to use without having some of the struggles that they have had the last couple of U.S. Opens. … If it’s set up the right way, I think it’s one of the best championship tests in the country. It’s an amazing golf course.”
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