DUBLIN, Ohio (AP) \u2014 Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy think the same way about Muirfield Village, and what it takes to succeed at the Memorial Tournament.<\/p>\n
This is a big golf course, but it\u2019s not all about power.<\/p>\n
\u201cHere it\u2019s more about placing the ball in the right spots and taking your opportunities when you can get them,\u201d said Scheffler, who speaks from the experience of winning the last two years.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor being such a long golf course, I feel like it takes driver out of my hand a lot,\u201d said McIlroy, who played for the 14th time without ever getting that winner\u2019s handshake from tournament host Jack Nicklaus off the 18th green.<\/p>\n
The Memorial is one tournament McIlroy can\u2019t seem to win \u2014 he\u2019s had only five finishes in the top 10 and never a reasonable chance to win.<\/p>\n
And it\u2019s the one tournament Scheffler can\u2019t seem to lose.<\/p>\n
Scheffler, the world\u2019s No. 1 player, sets out this week to try to join Tiger Woods as the only players to win three straight times at the tournament Nicklaus built.<\/p>\n
Nicklaus was asked why he thought Scheffler played so well at Muirfield Village, beyond the obvious of having great control of his shots. Nicklaus raised his right index finger and tapped the side of his head.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe thinks his way around the golf course,\u201d Nicklaus said. \u201cHis golf swing is certainly not spectacular from a standpoint of looking at balance \u2014 the pathway of his club is very good. But he doesn\u2019t put himself in position to make doubles and triples.\u201d<\/p>\n
Scheffler and McIlroy, Nos. 1 and 2 in the world, lead another strong field at the Memorial with the U.S. Open looming two weeks away. Both went to Shinnecock Hills on Monday on their way to central Ohio \u2014 they didn\u2019t play together \u2014 to scout the U.S. Open course.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not like they run in the same circles or even play in the same events. This is the 12th event for Scheffler this year, the 10th for McIlroy. But they have played the same tournament only six times, two of them majors and The Players Championship.<\/p>\n
Both have won this year, McIlroy\u2019s victory being far more meaningful. He held off Scheffler at Augusta National to become only the fourth back-to-back winner of the Masters.<\/p>\n
Scheffler, coming off another dominant season, won his first tournament of the season at The American Express. The rest of the year has been close calls \u2014 three runner-up finishes in a row, three other finishes in the top 5.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt like I haven\u2019t been as sharp as I would have liked to have been,\u201d Scheffler said. \u201cWhen you look at the margins in this game, they\u2019re quite small. I think statistically I\u2019m probably not far off from where I\u2019ve been the last couple years, it\u2019s just a couple shots here or there, a couple of those momentum shots where it can kind of swing you in a tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIlroy has the career Grand Slam, and it\u2019s cherry-picking what else he would like to win. Courses mean a lot to him. There\u2019s also an Olympic gold medal to chase once every four years, and Riviera and Muirfield Village \u2014 the tournaments hosts are Tiger Woods and Nicklaus \u2014 are on his list.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been lucky enough to win at Bay Hill, but not while Arnold (Palmer) was alive,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cSo I always thought it would be cool to win here and take that little walk up the hill off the 18th green and shake Jack\u2019s hand. Also, Jack and I share a nice history. I\u2019ve known him for nearly 20 years. He\u2019s been nothing but great to me and my family. So, yeah, this is certainly one I would love to get done.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIlroy skipped last year and played the RBC Canadian Open instead. He also missed in 2017 when he was tending to sore ribs from an injury earlier in the year. But he\u2019s played all the rest of them at Muirfield Village, just not with anything to show for it.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s not unusual in golf. Woods never figured out how to win at Riviera, the Los Angeles masterpiece that\u2019s one of his favorites and now is tournament host for the Genesis Invitational. Nicklaus was runner-up seven times at the Canadian Open. His only win in Canada was as Presidents Cup captain in 2007.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously a great list of champions on a wonderful golf course,\u201d McIlroy said of the Memorial. \u201cI haven\u2019t quite figured it out yet. It\u2019s frustrated me over my career. But hopefully, this is the week that I put it all together.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DUBLIN, Ohio (AP) \u2014 Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy think the same way about Muirfield Village, and what it takes to succeed at the Memorial Tournament. This is a big golf course, but it\u2019s not all about power. \u201cHere it\u2019s more about placing the ball in the right spots and taking your opportunities when you … Continue reading Scheffler and McIlroy see Muirfield Village the same way. Their results are different<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1452],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1512503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":true,"date":"2026-06-06 12:52:45","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[0],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1512503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1512503"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1512503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1512504,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1512503\/revisions\/1512504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1512503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1512503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1512503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}