Scottie Scheffler posted 22 under on Sunday in Blaine and never got within three of the lead. The kid who held him off has been a professional for about six weeks.
IN THIS ISSUE
Jackson Koivun Won in His Third Start as a Pro. Scheffler Was Second.
Jerry Kelly Won a Senior Major at 59. Lucas Herbert Shot 30-Under.
A Bettinardi Mallet That Skips Zero Torque, and a $129.99 Wedge With Vokey Spin
Paul Simson Won His 50th CGA Title. Terry Sanford Won Nationals by 12.
Ryan Gerard Was the Best North Carolinian at The Open
Wyndham Week at Sedgefield, Plus a Sandhills Trip That Isn't the Resort
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PGA TOUR . 3M OPEN
Jackson Koivun Won in His Third Start as a Pro. Scheffler Was Second.
Jackson Koivun closed bogey-free for a 5-under 66 and won the 3M Open by three at 25-under 259, a tournament record. He is 21 years old and this was his third professional start. He missed the cut at the John Deere three weeks ago.
The part that should scare everyone: Scheffler played five groups ahead, shot a bogey-free 63, and Koivun never blinked. His par save on the 9th, after an approach into the sand, was the whole tournament. The Auburn kid who owns the NCAA career scoring record didn't win because Scottie let him. He won because he was better on Sunday.
"All throughout the crowd I kept hearing, 'Scottie's coming. Scottie's coming.' I just tried to tune that out." - Jackson Koivun
$1.58 million. 500 FedExCup points. A 124-spot jump to 70th, the last playoff position. Third start.
PGA TOUR CHAMPIONS . ISPS HANDA SENIOR OPEN
Jerry Kelly, 59, Birdied the Last at Gleneagles
Kelly closed 68 with a birdie on 72 to win the ISPS HANDA Senior Open by two at 10-under, his 14th Champions title and third senior major. He's the oldest winner of this championship since Langer in 2019 and the first American-born winner since 2015.
The real prize: an exemption into the 2027 Open at St Andrews. Ernie Els, meanwhile, closed 72 to finish T14 and missed again on becoming the sixth man to win both the Open and the Senior Open. That club stays at five.
LIV GOLF . UK
Lucas Herbert Shot 30-Under and Broke a League Record Nobody Was Close To
Herbert went wire-to-wire at JCB and closed with a 62 to finish 30 under, the lowest winning score in LIV history. He also set the league record for birdies in a tournament with 30. Tyrrell Hatton shot 24 under and lost by six. Bryson was third at 21 under and it wasn't close.
That's five weeks of the best golf on the planet, counting his 62 at The Open. And because the Presidents Cup requires active PGA Tour membership, Herbert can't be picked. Brooks Koepka, reinstated in January, can. The International side has lost this thing ten straight times and the Tour just took its hottest player off the board.
$4 million. 30 birdies. Six shots. Uttoxeter has never seen anything like it.
ALSO THIS WEEK
Scheffler's Fifth Runner-Up of 2026 One win all year, at the American Express in January, and now five seconds to go with it, which is a strange kind of dominance.
LIV Heads to Bedminster in Two Weeks The season's next stop is Trump National in New Jersey after this week off.
LOOKING AHEAD
Rocket Classic at Detroit Golf Club
The Tour heads to Detroit Golf Club July 30 through August 2 for the Rocket Classic. This is one of the last two regular-season events before the playoff cutoff, so the players sitting between 60th and 90th in the FedEx Cup are playing for their August. Names to watch: Collin Morikawa, Cam Davis, and Keegan Bradley.
Bettinardi's New Mallet Skips the Zero-Torque Thing on Purpose
Every putter release for eighteen months has been zero torque. The Hexperimental #2 ($550) takes the high-MOI Antidote SB2 head and puts a traditional plumber's neck on it instead, because zero torque genuinely doesn't suit everybody's stroke. Milled 303 stainless face, aluminum body, limited run. Real talk: $550 is a lot for a putter and the head shape matters more than the price tag. But if you tried a zero-torque mallet and hated it, somebody finally built the version you wanted.
Maxfli XCW: Vokey Spin Numbers at $129.99
Golf Monthly put the new Maxfli XCW through testing and came back with spin numbers that match flagship tour wedges at $129.99 a club. Fully forged 1025 carbon steel, CNC-milled grooves, real grind options. That's roughly $60 less per wedge than a stock Vokey. The one honest knock: there's a notch of offset at address from the hosel transition, and some eyes will hate it. Go look at one in a store before you order three. If it doesn't bother you, this is the best short-game value in golf right now.
ALSO THIS WEEK
Fourteen FRZ Wedge The Japanese spin specialists laser-mill the space between the grooves to hold spin out of wet rough, 46 to 60 degrees, three grinds, roughly $240 a head.
Benross RS Irons Three hollow-body heads built on one platform for about $740 a seven-piece set, with a face lively enough to throw the occasional flyer.
Paul Simson Won His 50th CGA Title. At 70-Plus.
Raleigh's Paul Simson and Donald Detweiler took the 70+ division at the N.C. Super Senior Four-Ball at Greenville Country Club, rain-shortened to 27 holes, decided when Simson holed a 40-foot chip on the first playoff hole. That's his 50th CGA championship since 1990 and their 12th four-ball title as partners. Phil Bland and Joey Sadowski defended the 65+ title by five with five birdies and no bogeys over the closing nine. Nobody in Carolinas amateur golf is catching Simson's number.
Terry Sanford Won the PGA High School Nationals by 12
Fayetteville's Terry Sanford High opened 14-under 274 and closed it out at 22-under 554 to win the boys team title at Pinehurst by a dozen shots. Weather cut the boys event to 36 holes after two rain delays. More than 500 state-qualified players came through Pinehurst across the two championship weeks, and a North Carolina public school walked off with the trophy.
Preston Hage Goes From Raleigh CC Junior Camps to UNC
McConnell Golf profiled Preston Hage this week, a top national junior who started in camps at Raleigh Country Club at age three and now heads to Chapel Hill to play for the Heels. Between Hage and the rest of this recruiting class, UNC's pipeline out of the Triangle is in good shape.
Ryan Gerard Was the Best North Carolinian at The Open
Raleigh native, Ravenscroft grad, UNC product. Gerard followed a third-round 69 with a 72 to finish T9 at The Open, the first major top-10 of his career and the best finish by any golfer from this state. Alex Smalley, out of Wake Forest High and Duke, went the other direction: briefly atop the board Thursday, T53 by Sunday. Given the year Smalley's had, that's a blip, not a trend.
Sedgefield Survived the Drought. Wyndham Week Is Here.
Tents and grandstands are up in Greensboro with the PGA Tour advance crew arriving this week. Two milestones this year: 20 years of Wyndham as title sponsor and Sedgefield Country Club's 100th anniversary. Tournament director Bobby Powell says the Bermuda and the irrigation carried the course through months of drought before last week's rain, and that after last summer's flooding and the Wayne Road sinkhole, dry is the easier problem. If you're driving over, the last regular-season event before the playoffs always draws a decent bubble field.
Talamore: The Sandhills Trip That Isn't Pinehurst Resort
There are roughly 40 courses around Pinehurst and shockingly few that combine multiple good tracks, real lodging, and on-site dining without booking through the resort. Triangle Golf makes the case for Talamore, about a mile from the Village, as the strongest alternative for a buddies trip. Worth a look if the resort rates for a fall weekend made you close the tab.
ALSO THIS WEEK
Two Triangle Juniors Reach U.S. Junior Match Play Durham Trinity Academy's Stephen Eastman shot 1-over 142 to tie for 19th in stroke play at Saucon Valley and East Chapel Hill's Ryan Baker followed at 143, then both went out in the Round of 64, Baker 1 down to Hudson Justus and Eastman 5 and 4 to France's Callixte Alzas.
Precognition Comes To Charlotte If you have ever tried to will a downhill four-footer into the cup, the international Psi Games hits The Westin Charlotte July 31 through August 2, with remote viewing, psychokinesis and dowsing on the schedule, kind of makes reading a green feel like an entry-level skill.
TWO WAYS TO KEEP THIS GOING
Show up to a new course already knowing the move.
The next time a buddy picks a Triangle course you have never played, you will know which tees to play, where the trouble is, and what the locals actually pay before you leave the parking lot. That is the Triangle Golf Guide: 23 courses deep, plus the curated sim spots and the membership math worth knowing. Less than a range bucket, at $5.99.
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That's your read this week.
Tour intel, gear picks, and local course intel — every Tuesday.
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