Even though they’ve lifted the trophy just once in history, the vibes were high for Mike Weir’s International Team entering this weekend’s Presidents Cup in Quebec.
And while that kept them in nearly every match down the stretch on Thursday afternoon at Royal Montreal, the International Team is one again in a deep hole.
Scottie Scheffler and the United States edged out each of the five opening four-ball matches at the Presidents Cup on Thursday to pull off a rare first-round sweep at the biennial event. That gave the U.S. Team a dominant 5-0 lead heading into the second day of play.
This is now just the third time in history that a team has swept the first-round matches at the Presidents Cup. The United States has done it twice before, first in 1994 and again in 2000. By comparison, the United States has swept just one four-ball session at the Ryder Cup, back in 1984. It’s also the 38th time in the last 42 sessions that the Americans have held the lead.
While there’s a long way to go, the Americans have taken the first step to lifting a 10th straight Presidents Cup this weekend.
“Tough matches. A lot of them were 1 Up, even the whole day,” U.S. captain Jim Furyk said. “Our guys played great on the back nine. I would say, I hate to say it at times, it came down to a lot of putts … Our guys probably got the benefit of the doubt on that side of it, and I think that was the difference in a lot of matches. I think it was definitely a lot closer than 5-0.”
Scheffler set the tone for the Americans early on, and he and playing partner Russell Henley grabbed the biggest win of the day. The top-ranked golfer in the world, who is in the middle of a tear the sport hasn’t seen since Tiger Woods’ prime, erupted in Tom Kim’s face after responding with a huge putt early on to keep their match level before eventually grabbing the 3&2 win. That was the biggest margin of victory in the opening round.
Scheffler and Henley didn’t have many issues, but the rest of the U.S. Team largely allowed their opponents to hang in there longer than necessary. Just look at Xander Schauffele and Tony Finau, who nearly let their match slip away. They lost two straight holes and suddenly found themselves tied with Ben An and Jason Day with two holes to go after they both missed putts within 5 feet at the 16th.
Day and An were by far the closest to pulling off the win among the International Team pairs. Day just barely lipped out a deep birdie putt at the par-3 17th that would have flipped their match to their favor heading into the last hole. Instead, Schauffele bounced back with a birdie putt to put them in control and eventually give them the win.
Keegan Bradley helped save his match with partner Wyndham Clark with a deep birdie putt from off the green on the back nine, too. That putt, which came after they dropped two holes to Christiaan Bezuidenhout and Taylor Pendrith to leave the door open, eventually pushed them to the 1 Up win. Collin Morikawa and Sahith Theegala beat out Min Woo Lee and Adam Scott 1 Up in their match. Patrick Cantlay and Sam Burns, after falling back a hole early, cruised to a 2&1 win to complete the sweep.
The two teams will return on Friday for a series of five alternate shot matches. If the International Team is going to stay in this, they’ll have to try to gain at least a little ground on Friday before the weekend hits. Otherwise, even though the five matches on Thursday were tight, the Americans will be in a position to run away with the Presidents Cup yet again.
“We’re excited with our start,” Furyk said. “We’ll go in there [and] celebrate, high-fives, hugs. We’ve got to hunker down and get ready for tomorrow … We’re going to keep the pressure on.”
