For the first time since 2023, the men’s major championship season has come and gone without Scottie Scheffler lifting a trophy.
The World No. 1 posted a 3-under-par 67 in one last push Sunday at Royal Birkdale Golf Club, but he was already out of the running at the Open Championship when he finished the week at 7 under, ultimately tying Englishman Tommy Fleetwood for fourth.
Cameron Young had already posted the clubhouse lead at 9 under before New Zealand’s Ryan Fox made a late charge to win the Claret Jug with a 10-under 270.
“Going into today, I had some experience in comebacks in stuff like this,” Scheffler said, “and I told myself if I could go out and shoot 4 under on the front nine, I’d be right in it because the leaders wouldn’t have barely teed off yet, and that would have put me at 8, and (54-hole leader Sam Burns) would have been at 10.
“I definitely don’t regret any of the decisions that I made, either off the tee or going into greens today. I did a good job of staying aggressive and was committed to what I’m doing, and I was very proud of kind of how I played this week when I felt like things weren’t going necessarily my way. It was mentally, for me, I think, a really, really good week.”
Scheffler made the turn at 3 under par for the round and 7 under for the championship. When he holed a birdie putt from 14 1/2 feet away at the par-3 12th, he touched 8 under for the first time and knew he was in the mix.
But his hopes took a major hit at No. 13, where Scheffler missed the fairway right and could not advance his second shot more than a yard, as it stayed up on the hill in front of him. That led to a bogey, and a poor chip at the par-3 15th set him up for another.
Amid a poor putting week for Scheffler overall, he got a stroke back with an 11-foot birdie at No. 16 before a roller-coaster par-5 17th hole.
After a missed fairway, Scheffler had a blind second shot behind a large mound. He whacked a 3-wood that had the length to reach the green but missed badly to the left, near some tournament infrastructure.
As volunteers searched for his ball, Scheffler stopped them. He was awarded relief from the rules official walking with his group.
“The rules official said it landed just barely left of the grandstand thing,” Scheffler said. “I don’t know what you call that, like a sponsor area or something. And (caddie Ted Scott) had a bead right on where it was coming down.
“… We tried to figure it out. I said, ‘If I find it, does that help me; can I drop it?’ — since that would be about 50 yards closer to the hole. He said, ‘Yes, you can then use that spot, but you might have to go to the other side of the TIO (temporary immovable obstruction),’ which I didn’t know exactly where that would be, and that’s not a great angle coming across there.
“So decided to stop the search and go back and drop it doing point-of-entry TIO relief.”
The decision paid off. He was able to drop his ball short of the grandstand but got a clear line to the pin. He stuck his third shot 11 feet from the hole and converted an improbable birdie to get back to 8 under.
However, needing a birdie to tie Young for the clubhouse lead, Scheffler missed another fairway and watched his second shot settle next to a bunker below the green. He couldn’t get up and down for par and slid back to 7 under.
Scheffler, 30, hasn’t won a tournament of any kind since The American Express in January, his 20th on the PGA Tour. He also came to England on the heels of his first missed cut in four years at last week’s Scottish Open. But he did not express concern over the drought.
“Just those little kind of bounces,” Scheffler said. “My ball on 14 I think is in the fairway, I come up there, it’s in the pot bunker. Little stuff like that over the course of the week tends to add up.
“I competed really well this week. I did a good job of staying patient and hit the ball really nice over the course of four days. Maybe yesterday was the only day I didn’t strike it as well as I would have liked to.”
