Top golfers tee off in Hero World Challenge

By RENALDO DORSETT

Tribune Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

FIRST ROUND

11:05am - Matthew Fitzpatrick, Tyrrell Hatton

11:16am - Scottie Scheffler, Sam Burns

11:27am - Webb Simpson, Daniel Berger

11:38am - Harris English, Tony Finau

11:49am - Patrick Reed, Abraham Ancer

Noon - Henrik Stenson, Viktor Hovland

12:11pm - Justin Rose, Xander Schauffele

12:22pm - Collin Morikawa, Rory McIlroy

12:33pm - Justin Thomas, Brooks Koepka

12:44pm - Bryson DeChambeau, Jordan Spieth

The field of golfers in the 2021 Hero World Challenge had their first opportunity to take the course for this year’s event at yesterday’s Pro-Am, now all attention shifts to the main event when the first of four rounds tees off.

The four-round, 72-hole stroke play event features a $3.5 million purse, a $1 million winner’s prize and Official World Golf Ranking points awarded. It now features 20 of the top golfers on the PGA Tour after the field was expanded from its traditional 18.

Collin Morikawa, winner of the 2020 PGA Championship and 2021 Open Championship, will make his tournament debut.

“Yeah. Obviously, it’s really nice to be in The Bahamas. Was able to have a great practice round with Dr Munjal from Hero today,” he said. “Look, it’s the last event of the year and it’s weird to think about that because we’ve played so many times. It’s a good feeling, but I’m here to win and we’re here to play golf. You can look at it as a vacation, but at the end of the day, I still want to come out here and play really well. And obviously, over the past, you know, month and-a-half it’s been some pretty good golf and hopefully, we can just lead that on to finish off this year and head into 2022.”

Morikawa credited tournament host Tiger Woods for helping to expand the focus of the PGA Tour to locations like The Bahamas.

“That’s what’s been cool is that we’re able to travel, we’re able to come to places like this, even though it’s gorgeous, how do you just make that impact,” he said.

“I think you look at a guy like Tiger, who’s done his entire career pretty much on the PGA TOUR, and he’s made that impact, right? At 24 it’s thinking how do I make that impact in five years, in 10 years, but even, you know, in a month or in a year? How do you make that impact so young?”

Xander Schauffele returns to Albany following his gold medal performance at the Tokyo Olympics this summer. He looks to continue his recent momentum on the Albany course and cement his status among the game’s elite on the tour. “Well, I said I need to play my best golf against the best players in the world, but for me I need to play against the best in order to be the best and wherever that is, is where I will go. Right now the PGA TOUR has the best players in the world, so I’m playing on the PGA TOUR, it’s pretty simple,” he said. “It’s an interesting thing to think about. Yeah,

I’d say I’m amongst the top players in the world, I feel comfortable saying that based on ranking or feeling or just being out here with the guys like an office environment. Yeah, I’m pretty comfortable. This is my fifth or sixth year on Tour so I’ve become more and more comfortable out here and I still haven’t accomplished a lot of things I want to do. As I said, wherever that may be is where I’ll go.”

The Hero World Challenge, which began in 2000, was hosted at Grayhawk Golf Club in Arizona. It then moved to Sherwood Country Club in Los Angeles, where it enjoyed a 13-year tenure. The following year, it moved to the Isleworth Country Club in Florida before its most recent shift to The Bahamas.

Rory McIlroy has previously competed at the event in Sherwood and compared the experience to what he expects in The Bahamas.

“Yeah, I liked it at Sherwood. It feels like Christmastime. The Christmas trees were up and it sort of felt like the holidays, The Bahamas is a different feel and it’s certainly different here at Albany, but it’s nice,” he said. “I haven’t played this event in a while and I felt while I was starting to feel like I was getting my golf game back and playing well, I wanted to play a little bit and this is another opportunity to play well and just build on, I guess build on the good play that I’ve seen over the last couple of months.”

Past champions in the event have included Bubba Watson, Jon Rahm, Rickie Fowler, Hideki Matsuyama and most recently, Henrik Stenson.