five storylines – Scottie Scheffler turns 30 at Shinnecock while chasing the career Grand Slam, Brooks Koepka’s injury adds uncertainty to the defence, and the tournament’s history of surprise winners opens the door for longshots. Rory McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood, and a group aimi
Three hours west of Shinnecock Hills Golf Club. the Knicks’ epic NBA Finals comeback just finished rewriting what fans thought they’d already seen. Less than a day later. Josh Hart was already talking golf—posting “Now we play golf!” on X—and the U.S. Open at Shinnecock is set to begin Thursday in nearby Southampton.
This week’s venue has its own way of pulling attention: it tests every club. demands patience. and turns weather into a living factor. With wind expected to gust up to 33 m.p.h. and a course layout built around steep penalties for missing, Shinnecock promises pressure of the kind that makes storylines matter.
Scheffler’s 30th birthday arrives with the career Grand Slam within reach. Sunday’s final round will be Scottie Scheffler’s 30th birthday and also Father’s Day. It will also be the first proper chance for him to complete the career Grand Slam—a feat only six players. including Rory McIlroy. have accomplished.
Scheffler enters the U.S. Open with the resume to justify every hope. He is a four-time major champion and already has two Masters, a PGA Championship and an Open Championship. Over the last three years, his ability to hit fairways and greens—and his scrambling—has been described as world-class. Even if the season leading into Shinnecock hasn’t looked as dominant as some of his recent stretches. he is still positioned as a serious threat: he is second in the season-long FedEx Cup standings. first in the Official World Golf Rankings. and first in the Data Golf rankings.
Yet the cracks that have appeared can’t be ignored. He hasn’t won since his season opener in January. which quieted the Tiger Woods comparisons that surged after he won The Open last year. There have also been visible emotional moments on the course. including when he blew up after hitting a tee shot into the water on a par 3 at the Memorial Tournament earlier in June.
At Shinnecock, those swings of momentum are exactly what can turn a championship week into a scramble for survival. The course itself doesn’t resemble a typical bomb-and-gauge U.S. Open layout. Fairways are wide. and the rough isn’t quite as punishing. but the penalty for missing the mark still comes hard: well-placed bunkers sit across the 18 holes. Greens are the course’s top defence, and at Shinnecock, two-putts matter. The links-style geography near the Atlantic Ocean is another constant. with wind expected on Thursday and continuing through the weekend. and its direction expected to change during the practice rounds.
There’s also the memory of what can go wrong when conditions harden too fast. In 2018, the last time the U.S. Open came to Shinnecock, the USGA dealt with greens that became so firm they were essentially unplayable. Organizers will be focused on avoiding a repeat. especially since little rain is expected to soften things up—an uneasy balance between challenging and unfair.
Brooks Koepka’s defence carries its own kind of uncertainty, and it starts with the man himself. The 2018 champion, Koepka, won at 1-over for the second of his back-to-back U.S. Open titles, and that victory remains the only time in the last decade the U.S. Open winner finished above par. Now, Koepka is back at Shinnecock for the first time since that run.
His journey back to this stage has been anything but ordinary. He has moved through LIV Golf and returned to the PGA Tour. a pioneering comeback that has shaped how his year has looked. He has been forced to play lesser events to earn his spot at the big-money tournaments. but the early evidence—his ball striking—has flashed like vintage Koepka. At the start of the season he was described as being in full control off the tee and with the ball. The part that didn’t match that precision was putting.
More recently, though, the putting has begun to come around. He had been trending toward the kind of form that could set up another Shinnecock statement, including a first-round co-leader position at the RBC Canadian Open.
Then came a body issue that changes everything: a third-round 72 amid hand pain. He withdrew from Sunday’s final round at TPC Toronto, but he said Tuesday he still plans to tee it up.
The injury also leaves a range of outcomes open for the 36-year-old. He said he may be dealing with an ulnar nerve flare-up or thoracic outlet syndrome. If he’s feeling well enough, he should still be in the mix.
That uncertainty—combined with the U.S. Open’s history—feeds one of the tournament’s most compelling chances: the possibility of another surprise winner. JJ Spaun’s win last year. Wyndham Clark’s triumph in 2023. and Gary Woodland’s victory in 2019 are reminders that this major can reward the moment when a player finds the right rhythm.
On the PGA Tour side, the last four winners have been Bud Cauley, J.T. Poston, Russell Henley and Wyndham Clark—good players, but not exactly pre-tournament household names. If that is the blueprint. then recent performances could be read as warning signs for anyone assuming the leaderboard is only for the usual stars.
Kristoffer Reitan is one example. He won at Quail and has continued to play well since. Alex Fitzpatrick—brother of U.S. Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick—only gained PGA Tour membership in April. but is already 19th in the season-long FedEx Cup standings. Jacob Bridgeman won his first PGA Tour title at Riviera in February and sits eighth on that list.
Rory McIlroy’s U.S. Open case is as direct as it gets. McIlroy has said his career goals at this point are limited to big wins at iconic venues. and Shinnecock would fit that description. For the Northern Irishman and two-time reigning Masters champion. a seventh major title would lift him above Phil Mickelson (among others) and into the top-10 all time.
It would also keep the pursuit moving toward the career Slam twice over. Winning another Open Championship while chasing that standard would mean he would be one Open Championship shy of accomplishing the career Slam twice over, which only Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods have ever done.
There’s another familiar momentum story tied to Shinnecock: Tommy Fleetwood. His Ryder Cup teammate’s week contains a past highlight at the course. Fleetwood fired a stunning final-round 63 at Shinnecock in 2018, and he is looking to turn that memory into a long-awaited major title.
Ludvig Aberg adds a new edge to the field. He will play with McIlroy and Fleetwood on Thursday and Friday, and he is aiming for his breakthrough major.
For players who also know what it means to chase the biggest prize, the stakes keep sharpening. Xander Schauffele could collect his third major and put him a green jacket away from the Grand Slam. Jon Rahm, with the U.S. Open still open as a stepping stone, would head to The Open looking to do the same if he wins.
Then there is the Canadian storyline that could land with real weight. The quartet of Nick Taylor, Corey Conners, Sudarshan Yellamaraju and Ben Silverman are looking to become the first Canadian men to win a major since Mike Weir’s 2003 Masters triumph.
U.S. Open Shinnecock Hills Scottie Scheffler Brooks Koepka Rory McIlroy Tommy Fleetwood Ludvig Aberg Xander Schauffele Jon Rahm Nick Taylor Corey Conners Sudarshan Yellamaraju Ben Silverman