Golfweek went inside the numbers for trends and insights from the home of golf to help give context to what we have seen so far at the 150th British Open.
The number of major champions who will miss the final two rounds reached double digits.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Most every golfer in the world dreams of making a pilgrimage to the Home of Golf, its stunning assortment of links a top draw. The ancient city’s history opens eyes, as well. And an array of shops, pubs and restaurants adds to the powerful lure.
Even for those who have made the journey over and over again still can’t wait to return to this seaside village.
Leaving, however, is dreaded. Downright painful.
But leave is what many of the players in the 150th Open Championship did after the cut was made in the oldest tournament in golf. The number of major champions who will miss the final two rounds reached double digits.
The cut fell at even-par 144, with the top 70 and ties advancing.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Whatever Cameron Young can do, Cameron Smith is trying to do better.
It was the 24-year-old American Young who was “low Cameron” and tournament leader after 18 holes at the 150th British Open with a bogey-free 64 at The Old Course, but the Australian Cameron had the hot hand Friday, carding a splendid 64 of his own to open a two-stroke lead over his fellow Cam.
Smith improved to a total of 13-under 131, the lowest 36-hole score in an Open Championship. He raced out of the gate with three straight birdies and six in his first 10 holes to climb the leaderboard after Thursday’s opening-round 67.
“Got off to a really hot start,” he said. “And it’s very easy to just keep going, getting on the front foot and maybe trying to hit some shots that are a little bit too aggressive. But just stayed patient and holed some really nice putts.”
None more so than his highlight-reel putt of the day, a 64-foot right-to-left bending eagle putt at the par-5 14th to surge three strokes ahead at the time. Smith described his putting technique as trying to see the ball just drip in the front door of the cup.
Spectators watch Cameron Smith on the 18th hole from the balcony of the Rusacks Hotel during the second round of the 150th Open Championship at St. Andrews Old Course. (Photo: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports)
“That’s always been the last thought of mine, is take a long, hard look at the hole and really feel the putt,” said Smith, who doesn’t bother to take a practice stroke. “I just get up there and really feel it.”
Smith wore the expression of a man who knew there never was a doubt.
“Once it started breaking pretty good, about 10, 15 foot out, I thought it would have a chance,” he said. “And not really one that you’re trying to hole, you’re just trying to get a nice easy birdie, but nice of it to pop in the side there.”
It’s not just that Cam Smith makes putts, it blows my mind how he looks like he knew they were going in. As if to say, “Of course it went in, I meant for it to go in.” @golfweek@TheOpenhttps://t.co/Den8fm6aYu
Young, who played his college golf at Wake Forest, conceded that he didn’t putt quite as well as the first round, but he carded five birdies en route to shooting 69. A rookie on the PGA Tour, Young is still seeking his first Tour title but he has been knocking on the door, and got experience being in the hunt at the PGA Championship on Sunday before ultimately finishing T-3.
“Rather be in second than tenth,” he said of being in contention yet again. “You’re going to have to play some good golf over the weekend regardless.”
Chasing the two Cameron’s is some serious firepower. Northern Irishman Rory McIlroy (68), who is winless at the majors since 2014, and Norwegian Viktor Hovland (TK), who is seeking his first major, are tied for third at 10-under 134. Dustin Johnson, a two-time major winner is low-man among the LIV Golf players in the field, is a shot further back after 67.
“It’s a major. I want to come in here and play well and compete,” he said. “I feel like I put myself in a good position going into the weekend. Probably be a few back by the end of the day, I would imagine. Still in a good spot going into the weekend.”
Rory McIlroy watches a shot on the 15th hole during the second round of the 150th Open Championship at St. Andrews Old Course. (Photo: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports)
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who already won the Masters this season, posted a pair of 68s to tie for sixth with Englishman Tyrrell Hatton (66).
Australian Adam Scott recovered from a 4-over start in his first round and signed for 7-under 65 on Friday. He’s tied with the reigning PGA Tour Player of the Year and FedEx Cup champion Patrick Cantlay at 7-under 137.
“That’s what I needed,” Scott said. “I think getting back to even was huge yesterday. After six holes things weren’t feeling particularly good.”
The cut came at even-par 144, and among the casualties was defending champion Collin Morikawa and 15-time major champion Tiger Woods, who bowed out at 9-over 153.
Smith predicts that this weekend The Old Course will be even more of a challenge as it could get really firm and fast.
“This course bakes out so quickly,” said Smith. “I’ve always been a pretty good player in tough conditions. I think most Aussies are, for some reason. I think we’re all brought up to be smart golfers, hit away from the pin sometimes. And that really serves us well, I think, in big tournaments and when the conditions get tough.”
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No one takes pictures of the descent down Everest.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — It’s the prodigy’s burden to forever be judged against the athlete they were in the flush of youth, before accumulated scar tissue and assorted speed bumps dented both undercarriage and confidence. Comparisons to a younger self are particularly unfair for those aging legends inextricably linked to the fields of play on which their reputations were forged. Take Serena Williams. Defeated in her opening match at Wimbledon last month, the step or two she’s lost over time seemed more pronounced on the very same Center Court where she’d won seven titles.
Which brings us to Tiger Woods and St. Andrews. The Old Course is his Elysian Fields, the fabled preserve of gods and heroes in Greek mythology. His performances here — winning in 2000 and 2005 by a combined 13 strokes — did much to burnish the Woods legend. Those were his 4th and 10th major victories. There have been five more since, but his place in the pantheon was cemented with that triumph 17 years ago. Winning twice at golf’s ancestral home secures that.
That’s a tough standard to sustain, of course, and Woods hasn’t done so. He’s competed in three Opens here since that ’05 win: an undistinguished tie for 23rd in 2010, and missed cuts in ’15 and now ’22. In time, those latter results will be forgotten, just like Jack Nicklaus’s desultory results in five St. Andrews Opens after his second victory, and for the same reason Alfred Hitchcock is remembered for Psycho and The Birds rather than the crummy flicks of his declining years. No one takes pictures of the descent down Everest.
The increasingly unrealistic expectations that accompany Woods most everywhere — a residue of having won most everywhere — have never dampened his ardor for competing at the Old. Repeatedly this week he called it his favorite course, and said it has been since he first played here as an amateur in 1995. The dates of the 150th Open loomed large during his rehabilitation after a near-fatal car crash 17 months ago.
“I was hoping I could play this event,” he said Thursday, after opening with a dismal 78. “Looking at it at the beginning of the year, end of last year, when I was rehabbing, trying to see if I could do it. To hopefully be well enough to play it.”
He was well enough to play, but not enough to play well.
“I made my share of mistakes,” he said Friday, after a 75 left him tied for 149th out of 156. “I just never got anything going.”
His fans will draw comfort from a comment after the first round when he said the physical strain of playing was less than at the other two majors he contested earlier this year. A blunted game or lack of competitive sharpness is something that can be addressed. The physical sphere has less headroom for improvement.
Time, as it relates to his future, was front of mind for Woods after he exited the final green to a standing ovation.
“I don’t know if I’ll be physically able to play another British Open here at St. Andrews,” he said. “I certainly feel that I’ll be able to play more British Opens, but I don’t know if I’ll be around when it comes back here.”
The next unannounced date on the Open Championship rota is 2026, but with Royal Lytham and Muirfield due for a return first, the game’s oldest major might not be back in St. Andrews for six years or more, by which time an already battered Woods would be at least 52 years old. Like everything else in his world — game, body, schedule — there is great uncertainty around Woods’s future in the Open.
“To me, it felt like this might have been my last British Open here at St. Andrews. And the fans, the ovation and the warmth, it was an unbelievable feeling,” he said after an emotional walk up the last fairway. “Just the collective warmth and understanding. They understand what golf’s all about and what it takes to be an Open champion.”
The continuum of golf’s history began in St. Andrews and still arcs back through the town every few years. Reminders of the sport’s most imposing figures are everywhere, if you know where to look. As Woods tapped in on what might be his last-ever hole in an Open at the Old Course, an elderly woman applauded from a second-floor window overlooking the 18th green. Her name is Sheila Walker, and she’s the great-great-granddaughter and last surviving relative of Old Tom Morris, above whose original shop she still lives, keeping watch over the generations who followed her legendary forebear.
With a little luck on either side, they will see each other again in St. Andrews.
“Tha dòchas ann,” as a Scottish Gaelic saying goes. There is hope.
Tiger Woods may have just walked his final time at the 18th in St. Andrews at an Open Championship.
It’s difficult to think about, but true — Tiger Woods may have just walked his final time down the 18th hole at St. Andrews during an Open Championship.
Woods played 58 holes in the lead-up to the Open Championship, not to mention several rounds in Ireland as part of his tournament preparation, but he failed to make a serious run at the cut. Still, Woods’ exit was emotional and an enormous moment in the history of golf. If you missed the full recap of his second round, find it here.
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”I was in the moment … I’ve taken a little bit of heat for it.”
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – When Talor Gooch was interviewed after being a member of the Four Aces team in the LIV Golf Invitational Series at Pumpkin Ridge in Oregon, he said one of the most moronic things ever uttered at a professional golf tournament.
Social media quickly dubbed Gooch “the stupidest man in golf” and he conceded on Friday, after shooting 3-under 69 and improving to 7-under 137 at the midway point of the 150th Open, that he’s received some good-natured ribbing from his fellow pros.
“A bunch of players came up, and they’re like, ‘Really? Really? I was like, hold on a second, guys. Give me a little break. I just won. I was in the moment. I might have gotten a little aggressive with the comments.’ ” Gooch said. “It was just I was in the moment with them. We were pumped. I watch F1. I was so pumped to be able to spray champagne like they do in F1. I was in the moment. Maybe a little aggressive of a comment. Rightfully so, I’ve taken a little bit of heat for it.”
Asked to share the funniest comment, he thought for a moment and said, “I don’t know if I can say it out loud. It’s everything you could expect. This dumb kid from Oklahoma, blah, blah, blah. You’re never going to blah, blah, blah. It’s been everything you can imagine. Hey, that’s all right.”
Gooch, a 30-year-old former Oklahoma State University golfer and one-time winner on the PGA Tour, was in the midst of a breakthrough season and had risen to a career-best No. 31 in the Official World Golf Ranking. He confirmed that he only intended to play the first LIV Golf event. Then he was suspended by the PGA Tour for violation of its regulations and claims that he was caught by surprise even though the Tour had threatened it would do just that.
“Historically the Tour has not done that,” Gooch explained. “So based on the history, that was my expectation.”
Give Gooch credit for at least realizing that a trip to The Old Course was worth the hassle of traveling overseas with his wife and 1-year-old daughter so they could experience the Home of Golf as a family.
“There’s nothing better. It’s the mecca of golf,” he said noting they walked through the town, enjoyed a few pints of beer and stopped by the grave of Old Tom Morris.
Gooch is one of a handful of LIV Golf defectors who is in contention so far, and he said it has served as fuel to their fire.
“Everybody, it feels like, is against us, and that’s OK,” he said. “It’s kind of banded us together.”
Gooch hadn’t read the R&A’s comments that it reserved the right to change its qualification criteria for future Opens, which might force him to play in opening qualifying in the future, but he said those decisions will be determined by others smarter than him.
“I’d like to think that the majors would like to have the best players in the world playing in their events in spite of everything that’s going on, but obviously that’s not up to me. It’s up to other people,” he said. “Hopefully this won’t be my last one.”
Calcavecchia soaked it all in, especially the warm send-off from the fans.
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Mark Calcavecchia said so long to The Old Course on his terms.
So what that he shot 83-82 to miss the cut by a mile. The 1989 Champion Golfer of the Year hit the opening tee shot of Friday’s second round at 6:35 a.m. local time, and strode across the Swilcan Bridge one last time. Making his 31st appearance in the world’s oldest championship, he conceded the moment got the better of him.
“I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I felt it. I felt the emotions,” Calcavecchia said. “Got a little mildly choked up.”
Calcavecchia, who won 13 times on the PGA Tour and four more times on the Champions Tour, was supposed to have had his swan song at The Open in 2020 at Royal St. George’s but it was canceled due to the global pandemic. In 2021, he had back surgery and was unable to play. So, he wrote the Open committee a letter asking them to give him one final start at the 150th Open at age 62.
“They got right back to me and said, ‘Let me bring it up to the championship committee.’ And not even a few weeks later, I got an email back. The decision by the 25 committee members was unanimous. ‘We’d love to have you play your last Open at St. Andrews. We love to take care of our past champions,’ ” Calcavecchia told PGA Tour.com earlier this year.
So, he brought his wife, son, daughter and son-in-law, the latter three making their first trip to the Home of Golf. His golf clubs? They didn’t arrive until Wednesday, so he played in the Celebration of Champions out of the bag of Ian Baker-Finch. Calcavecchia soaked it all in, especially the warm send-off from the fans.
“It wouldn’t have mattered if I shot a pair of 75s or a pair of 85s, which I nearly did. It was about playing one more, my last one here at the home of golf, which is really cool to be able to end it here,” he said.
Cameron Young, a PGA Tour rookie who missed the cut at the Scottish Open last week but has amassed five top 5s this season including a T-3 at the PGA Championship, got off to a hot start at The Old Course in the 150th Open Championship.
Young made back-to-back birdies on two occasions during his front nine and added another circle at the ninth to go out with a 31. He’d come home with a 33 after a birdie at the 18th and signed for a bogey-free 8-under 64.
