Tiger-esque Scottie Scheffler delivers one of the great Open performances
ROYAL PORTRUSH — Were his career set to music Scottie Scheffler might resemble the hero of a spaghetti western, riding towards the sunset to the strains of Ennio Morricone, the bodies of those who stood against him scattered all about the floor.
At least the walk down 18 appeared to move him, the removal of his cap in response to the applause shifting him ever so slightly off his monochrome axis. And of course, there was the obligatory embrace with devoted wife Meredith and son Bennett, reminders that he has a sentient dimension away from the course.
The best way to distil Scheffler is by numbers. The margin of victory after his closing 68 was four, precisely where it had been at the start of play. Only the personnel had changed, Harris English slipping past Scheffler’s playing partner, Haotong Li, to claim second place.
Scheffler entered the realm of four major wins, in just his 25th start, with his crushing victory at Royal Portrush. Having claimed the PGA Championship in May, the US Open remains the only major to elude him. By the time he sets foot at Shinnecock Hills next year, the grand slam he seeks might easily become a Scheffler slam too.
None has won all four majors in a calendar year. Only Tiger Woods has held all four simultaneously, yet this could be Scheffler’s fate should he continue to dominate the game as emphatically as he did here.
Shane Lowry made the most salient point of the week when he said we had got Scheffler all wrong by focusing on his cataclysmic feet. If you ignore his legs at impact, Lowry observed, he is basically Woods 2.0.
This was his 10th consecutive win from a 54-hole lead, the best since Woods. Since recording his maiden win in February 2022, Scheffler has clocked 17 victories including four majors. He has not missed a cut since the Fed-Ex St Jude Championship in August 2022.
The streak hit 60 at Portrush, bettered only by Xander Schauffele (69). He had played just four Opens before Portrush. Few who saw his 64 on Friday doubted the fifth would yield the Claret Jug.
The Open 2025 leaderboard
- 1st Scottie Scheffler -17
- 2nd Harris English -13
- 3rd Chris Gotterup -12
- T4 Wyndham Clark, Haotong Li, Matt Fitzpatrick -11
- T7 Robert MacIntyre, Xander Schauffele, Rory McIlroy -10
- T10 Bryson DeChambeau, Corey Conners, Brian Harman, Russell Henley -9
- See the full leaderboard on TheOpen.com
When the ball slips off its string, as it did off the par-5 seventh tee when Scheffler found sand, he simply hitches his breeches and gets on with it. In this case advancing his ball 80 yards before leaving himself a 15-footer for par, which, of course, found the centre of the cup. He was now 32 holes and counting since his last dropped shot at the 11th on Friday.
The emotional control is impressive. Rory McIlroy flags the mood swings with every step he takes. Scheffler gives off the loner vibes of the high plains drifter of the American West, eyes locked on the horizon, never looking back.
And then a shock shift in temperature. Scoreboard watchers were rubbing their eyes wondering if what they were seeing were a mirage, a trick of the light brought about by the punishing environment.
Yet it was true, Scheffler had given two shots back at one hole, the eighth, where he twice found sand on his way to the green. A lead that had stood at seven shrank to four following a Chris Gotterup birdie two groups ahead at the ninth.
Were Scheffler keyed into the ebb and flow of the tournament he might have betrayed a degree of bother. However, he does not engage in this way. He is only ever concerned with his own ball and does not allow disappointment to linger. Thus to the ninth he went to register his fourth birdie of the round and restore the lead to five.
The door was never really open, of course, it just felt that way to rivals feeding on scraps. False hope, cruel as it is, is hope after all. We were witness to one of the great Open performances, Woods-esque execution extinguishing utterly the light of others.
