The scene, second guessing from the 5-0 sweep

September 28, 2024

8

Si Woo Kim earned a 5-0 victory on Friday in the Presidents Cup.

Getty Images

Three of our writers are on the ground at Royal Montreal for this weekend’s Presidents Cup. After Thursday went a way (a 5-0 US sweep) and Friday went the next (a 5-0 international sweep) we brought them together for a round-by-round breakdown.

Dylan Dethier, senior writer (@dylan_dethier): Hello, James. Hello Nick. It’s Friday night in Montreal and whoops – what a difference a day makes. I can’t stop thinking about this time last night when things were dark. It didn’t look like the event was over as the heavily favored American side went up by five figures. It felt like the Presidents Cup himself it may be over. If that sounds dramatic and silly, well, it probably was. However, it feels different now. So I’ll start with a simple question: What the hell did we see?

James Colgan, news and features editor (@jamescolgan26): Man, I think we just saw an explosion. The Internationals held off the Americans from the opening bell. In five alternate-shot matches, only two lasted past the 14th hole — and both were won by INT, anyway. It’s hard to fathom what two complete shenanigans from either team mean for where this is going, but man, that was exciting.

Nick Piastowski, Senior Editor (@nickpia): The Road-Ryder Cup Americans appeared. They got punched in the mouth in the opening game (Hideki Matsuyama and Sungjae Im knocked off Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay 7 and 6) and the dominoes — and international shots — fell from there. Wild. We were also talking about this after a great Tim Horton’s breakfast (shut-out Tim Bits!) about how the USA seems to play better on the road in the Presidents Cup, versus the Ryder Cup. Maybe the genie came from us?

Dethier: It cannot be ruled out! There’s no doubt that Friday was just an all-around mess, but the putting statistics were particularly shocking: Every single American missed shots on the green on Friday, while eight of the 10 internationals were positive. Our Sean Zak wrote about it more, but it got me thinking about the cliche of the game about how the winning team “just took more shots” and how, on Friday, that was basically true.

So how do we understand this? We could throw up our hands and cite coincidence, I guess, or the golf gods, but that’s not very interesting. Instead, I think it’s worth focusing on what we saw, heard and felt – and what the players did too. How differently they did things smelt out on the course friday vs thursday?

Colgan: Like the difference between a funeral and a rock concert. The fans were attacked. of the players were imprisoned. Whatever aerosolized Xanax the Montreal Royals used on Thursday was consumed by the start of the game.

Piastowski: The fans were very diverse, to be sure, and I spent the afternoon observing a few, including Mackenzie’s best friend Hughes – who was easily spotted while holding a giant severed head of Hughes. bravo But I will add another thought and say that it seems there were some speeches last night by internationals, and they came out with their hair and golf bags on fire. On Friday, the US was a flat bunch.

Dethier: Agree for the fans. And look, there’s some chicken-and-egg stuff going on here. Like, fans were cool on Thursday because their team was losing, but maybe, just maybe, their team was partially losing too BECAUSE were they silent?

Regardless, things were different on Friday immediately. The opening tee was rocking. My dumbest guess that I actually believe is that the change in the first DJ’s set list (faster cuts, louder music, better choices, dramatically different, I tell you) made the difference in the match. It was the first domino to fall. The fans went wild, the players jumped, the internationals went 3-0-2 on the first hole and kept it going big time from there. If Thursday’s crowds felt like they’d been out for a nice walk and stumbled into a golf tournament, Friday felt like they were out at a hockey game — and they’d been tailgating on the way in. Corey Conners and Mackenzie Hughes have never felt that in their lives.

But let’s make a second guess. Should American captain Jim Furyk have done something differently?

Colgan: Eh, the pairings were mostly good. If Furyk made a mistake, it was in failing to prepare his team for the all-out offensive everyone he knew it would come today. This happens all too often with American teams in these events, but I’m not sure how much of that falls on the captain.

Piastowski: Maybe play Keegan? But only he and Burns sat down, and the pairs were partly the same. Maybe the 5-0 lead made them relax and I’d rather they channel “relentless”.

Dethier: When the captain picks came out, my immediate reaction was surprise that Furyk had gone with Brian Harman over Justin Thomas. I couldn’t help but think about that all Friday afternoon when Harman struggled playing alongside Max Homme. Again, I couldn’t believe Internationals captain Mike Weir dropped Tom Kim for the Friday games, so I’m not sure they should be taking advice from me anyway – that strategy worked well.

But guys, I kept bumping into you out there, wandering inside the ropes on this beautiful Quebecois afternoon. Give a scene from out there that made you feel something.

Colgan: Standing on the sidelines of the 18th hole when Si Woo Kim teed off to beat world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler was pretty epic. (Watch the “C’mere” he gives to his teammates when the shot goes down in the video below.) All day that game looked like one the Americans could bring back, but Si Woo and Ben An pulled it off when it mattered. Incredible, impossible, incredible win to bring the score back to a draw.