After U.S. Open struggles, Scottie Scheffler to reassess major prep

PINEHURST, N.C. – Twice in his post-round interview, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler called the Pinehurst No. 2 course “fun,” but did he have fun?

“Playing poor golf is not fun but I like the challenging aspect of it and I’ll sit back the next few days and think about what went wrong,” Scheffler said following a second-round, 4-over 74.

When Scheffler signed his scorecard Friday afternoon, he thought he was going to have the weekend off to contemplate his first missed cut since the 2022 FedEx St. Jude Championship.

But he made it on the number, at 5 over par, and will have a couple more days to get back on track.

It’s been a strange week for Scheffler, and that’s saying something considering he was able to post a top-10 finish at the PGA Championship after spending Friday morning in jail on charges that have since been dropped. His opening round at Pinehurst was marked by uncharacteristically poor ball-striking.

He was able to post a 1-over 71 Thursday, despite giving shots to the field off the tee and hitting just six of 14 fairways, thanks to a solid day on the greens. On Day 2, he was able to improve his play off the tee but struggled on and around Pinehurst’s domed greens. That included making a double-bogey 7 at the par-5 fifth hole after being entangled in one the iconic course’s native areas.

“I don’t feel like my game is very far off. I had one day this week where, yesterday, when I wasn’t swinging my best but I was able to post a score and today I just couldn’t get anything going in a positive direction,” he said. “I wasn’t seeing the break right on the greens, wasn’t able to hit close enough to the hole down the stretch to get some close looks. I’ll go back and assess my prep for this week, see what I could have done differently and then see what I could have done differently mentally the last couple of days.”

Part of that assessment will be his schedule. Like most of the game’s top players, Scheffler played last week’s Memorial which is one of the PGA Tour’s signature events and one of the year’s most grueling tests. Although the Tour didn’t give players much of a choice, Scheffler said he might reconsider playing the week before a major.

“I’ve played the week before majors a few times and the only one I specifically remember was going into the Masters my rookie year; I played really good at the [2021 WGC-Match Play] and lost to [Billy Horschel] in the finals and then I went and played San Antonio which I don’t think I should have done,” he said. “Going forward, that’s something I’m really going to take a harder look at, my prep for the majors.”

For now, though, he still has 36 holes in front of him at Pinehurst No. 2. The world No. 1 will look to at least keep alive his streak of consecutive top-20 finishes, which began at last year’s BMW Championship and now stands at 15.