U.S. rallies in singles for 11th straight Presidents Cup victory
Somehow, they did it.
The United States needed an unlikely eight wins in Sunday’s 12 singles matches to retain the Presidents Cup and extend its winning streak to 11 in the biennial golf matchup against the International team.
A big deficit at the start of the fourth and final day at Medinah Country Club didn’t look impossible after the U.S. won four of the first six matches to cut the International’s point margin to 12½-10½. The U.S. still needed to get 15½ points to retain the Cup while the Internationals needed that number to win it. Each match was worth a point.
The final score was 17 to 13, but that didn’t reflect the excitement of the final day. U.S. captain Brandt Snedeker was emotionally drained afterward. He focused his comments on his young players, rather than the veterans.
“A lot of stuff happened here,” he said. “I’m really proud of Jackson Koivun and Jacob Bridgeman.”
Koivun, the 21-year-old fresh out of Auburn University, was the only undefeated player and Bridgeman earned the clinching point. It was his first point in Presidents Cup play.
Chris Gotterup, who in July won the John Deere Classic — Illinois’ only annual PGA Tour stop — joined his playing partner Cameron Young and Justin Thomas to spur the U.S. team’s comeback bid in singles.
Young won the day’s first match convincingly 3&2. Thomas was even better, going 5-up before dispatching Canada’s best player, Corey Conners, 5&3. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, held out of the lineup in Saturday afternoon’s alternate shot session, added a 2&1 win in the fourth match and Gotterup took the sixth in a nail-biter. He was 3-up after eight holes but needed to two-putt for par on the 18th to get the win.
When Gotterup’s last putt dropped, the U.S. led in four matches still on the course while two others were tied. A come-from-behind win was not out of the question for the U.S. with its 13-1-1 record entering this week’s competition.
The lead at the start of the day for the Internationals, which had players from around the world minus Europe, was gone when Patrick Cantlay and Collin Morikawa won their matches to make it 13½ to 12½.
“We knew where we stood,” Morikawa said. “We had to go out and finish our business. That’s all we could do.”
There were still four matches left, and only Xander Schauffele’s 4-up lead on Ryan Fox in the last match was a likely win for the U.S.
Koivun defeated Si Woo Kim 2-up to give the U.S. a two-point lead and left Schauffele or Bridgeman and Russell Henley, locked in tie matches, to get the point needed to retain the Cup for the U.S. Bridgeman did the honors.
Schaufelle finished his match with a 2&1 win and Russell Henley earned a tie in the last match of the exciting week that produced a much more happy result for the U.S. than the last big team event at Medinah. In 2012 the U.S. had a 10-6 lead on Europe entering the final day of the Ryder Cup and couldn’t get the victory.