reason – Golfing Networks

This U.S. Women’s Open is special for a much bigger reason

admin — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 06:13:44 +0000

PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — There’s a statue at Riviera Country Club that lords over the entire place. From high on its perch, just outside the clubhouse on a hill, a dark brown bust of Ben Hogan overlooks the 18th green. The course is nicknamed Hogan’s Alley, for his three different wins here in the 1940s, and at the base of that statue are the names of other winners at Riv. In a few months, here in the club’s centennial year, that statue will finally add a woman’s name to the plaque. This is the first women’s tournament played at Riviera Country Club.

“I say it all the time,” Morgan Pressel said Wednesday morning, along the 1st fairway. “I say it literally every chance I get. I believe very strongly about how important venues are.”

It has been a bit of a crusade for Pressel, the idea that some of the biggest events in women’s golf have long struggled to access the courses where men have made golf history. It’s why Pressel signed off from her week of analysis on the 2021 USWO broadcast on NBC in such a giddy mood. She had just watched Yuka Saso chase down Lexi Thompson at Olympic Club, which had hosted five U.S. Opens, but never the women’s.

“To add our own history to the already storied history at Olympic Club — it was a really special week … I remember when Pebble Beach was announced [as 2023 host]. I was like ‘Ohmygoodness. We get to play Pebble Beach.’”

Pressel would have loved to compete at Riv during her days atop the pro game. But she played during an era where the biggest event in women’s golf was played at less-heralded courses. The reason why would never be clear, but instead of playing Pebble Beach, in Northern California, the USWO went to nearby Cordevalle. Instead of the game’s best taking on Merion, where the most famous photo of competitive golf was snapped — yes, more Hogan — the ladies played 70 miles west in Lancaster. Instead of taking on big and burly Shinnecock in 2013, they went farther out on Long Island to Sebonack. And instead of making that weird distinction forever and ever, the USGA made a pivot.

“Eight or nine years ago, our strategies changed,” John Bodenhamer, USGA chief championship officer, said Wednesday. “We put at the top of our pyramid going to America’s greatest venues. When we say that, we mean it, and we start with the golf course, and [Riviera] is one of America’s greatest venues.”

The implementation has been somewhat sporadic, as Lancaster hosted again in 2024 and Erin Hills last summer, but the USGA’s run of bringing the women to the game’s most iconic haunts starts in earnest this week.

From Riviera, the ladies will head to Inverness Club, a Donald Ross classic in Toledo that has hosted six men’s majors, zero women’s. Then it’s off to Oakmont, where last summer J.J. Spaun made one of the most memorable putts in USGA history. Then it’s Pinehurst in 2029, the week directly following the men’s U.S. Open there — and, no, the timing is not by chance. Oh, you tuned in to watch Rory and the boys rip around the waste areas? Nelly and the girls will do the same in just a couple days.

The USGA has announced 17 of the next 22 USWO sites, a number of which will host the women for the first time after decades of hosting the men. We’re talking Oakland Hills, Merion, Shinnecock.

“If we’re going to talk about equality and equity, we have to talk about the playing fields,” Pressel continued. “When you talk about golf specifically, there are historic venues that withstand the test of time. They’re far more famous than any single player and any era. Every era they have their moments and their history and their fame.”

At Riv, it goes back to that statue on the hill. Hogan’s 18-month run through the 1947 LA Open, the 1948 LA Open and then the 1948 U.S. Open. But in modern years it’s much more than Hogan or majors — it’s been the Genesis Invitational, annually one of the top events on the PGA Tour, where Dustin Johnson seemed to perfect the sport in 2017, and where Hideki Matsuyama shot a winning 63 in 2024, and where Adam Scott and Phil Mickelson and Jon Rahm all won as well.

The women are experiencing all their peers have been able to throughout the decades — using the same locker room, the same workout facility, scheming their way around the devilish 10th in similar and different ways than the men ever would. Some of them have been quizzing their PGA Tour friends about how to work their way around the course. They’ll snap photos from Riviera’s epic 1st tee, where a 16-year-old Tiger Woods hit his first shot in a professional event. And at the end of their week they’ll summit that mountain of stairs behind the 18th hole, where each of those winners were celebrated en route to sign their scorecards. Yuka Saso carried her clubs up that hill Monday afternoon, almost out of breath, but still having enough to shout, “I just climbed Mount Everest!”

That’s what the women’s game has finally been allowed to do, slowly but surely change its elevation. Royal Troon, in Scotland, hosted its first Women’s Open in 2020. Muirfield, on the other side of the old country, made its debut in 2022. Both clubs existed for more than a century without female members, let alone host women’s majors. It still took the Old Course in St. Andrews until 2007, during Pressel’s second year as a pro, to host the Women’s Open. It’s done so three times now and has delivered three legendary winners: Lorena Ochoa, Stacy Lewis and Lydia Ko.

Pressel calls it all an “arms race” between golf’s governing bodies — both the recent history and future lineup. The PGA of America has Congressional, Hazeltine and Bethpage Black on tap. In 2027, the R&A will bring the women to Royal St. George’s for the first time … after already hosting 15 men’s Opens — with victories from Vardon to Hagen to Norman.

Pressel believes in the connection between winner and venue. She thinks about the feeling NBA players get winning at Madison Square Garden. She thinks about that time she flew to see Taylor Swift play at Wembley Stadium. She thinks about her friend, Paula Creamer, not just winning a U.S. Open, but winning an Open at Oakmont.

“Everybody wants to either be the competitor there, or be the person there watching it,” she said. “It all just elevates women’s golf the more they can be on that playing field.”

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The selfish reason Alex Fitzpatrick caddied for Matt at US Amateur

admin — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 15:11:50 +0000

Matt and Alex Fitzpatrick’s emotional victory at last week’s Zurich Classic was not the first time the brothers teamed up for a big win. Back in 2013, a 13-year-old Alex caddied for Matt during his U.S. Amateur victory at the Country Club.

If you thought that would be a dream-come-true for the pre-High School Alex, you thought wrong.

It turns out that the Fitzpatrick parents had to bribe their young son with a shiny new device to convince him to carry Matt’s bag that week, as Alex explained on Tuesday at the 2026 Cadillac Championship.

Alex Fitzpatrick ready to break out of Matt’s shadow after PGA Tour promotion

For most of their lives, Alex Fitzpatrick had to live in the shadow of his big brother. Matt Fitzpatrick showed signs of greatness early on.

He backed them up with a career-changing victory at the 2022 U.S. Open, at the exact same course, the Country Club in Brookline, where he won the U.S. Amateur with Alex on the bag nine years before.

Here’s everything a PGA Tour win gave Matt Fitzpatrick’s brother Alex

By:

James Colgan

Matt is currently on the hottest streak of his career, having won three PGA Tour events since late March to rise to World No. 3. But Alex is on a tear of his own.

After capturing his first DP World Tour win in March, he teed it up with Matt at the PGA Tour’s Zurich Classic of New Orleans last week, for what he was expecting to simply be a good opportunity for “spending time with my brother.”

Alex got the family time he was looking for, but he also walked away with a victory, giving him a PGA Tour card for two years, over $1 million in prize money and spots in the remaining Signature Events.

So while Matt is taking it easy this week following his third win of the year, Alex is in Florida to play the Cadillac Championship.

Alex Fitzpatrick reveals parents’ bribery scheme to get him to caddie for Matt

During his pre-tournament press conference, Fitzpatrick was asked about his original partnership with his brother Matt at the 2013 U.S. Amateur.

For outsiders, it was a fairytale week that harkened back to Francis Ouimet’s U.S. Open win at Brookline one hundred years before, when 10-year-old Eddie Lowery famously carried his bag.

For Alex, the vibe was very different. In fact, he didn’t want to caddie for Matt that week at all. Their dad, Russell Fitzpatrick, was then forced to take an extreme measure to make it happen: bribery. He promised to buy Alex a new phone if he caddied for Matt in the tournament.

“I only caddied for [Matt] at the U.S. Amateur because my dad promised me a new phone,” Alex revealed in his Tuesday press conference at Trump Doral. “That was only reason why I caddied for him, because it was too expensive to buy a caddie for the week, so I got dragged into that one.”

Alex added that he did indeed get his new phone after Matt won, calling it a “win-win.”

“And then he won and then I got a new phone, so it was a win-win all around,” he joked.

Alex Fitzpatrick’s parents had to bribe him with a new phone to get him to caddie for Matt at the U.S. Amateur.

Matt Fitzpatrick took home the Havemeyer Trophy. Alex got a new phone. pic.twitter.com/DG4dj698gP

— GOLF.com (@GOLF_com) April 29, 2026

It’s been a whirlwind few days since the Zurich triumph, but now Alex is set to chart his own PGA Tour career without his brother by his side beginning at the Cadillac Championship.

While Matt won’t be there in person, he did send Alex a touching note of encouragement for the Cadillac the morning after their Zurich victory.

“He just said, you know, he said enjoy it. He sent me a really nice text the morning afterwards that was like, you know, as much as this win is both of us, you deserve to be here, you’re playing some great golf, go out there and show them what you have and just try and enjoy it as much as you can really, that was the biggest message from him,” Alex said on Tuesday.

Fitzpatrick tees off for the first round of his new PGA Tour career on Thursday at 1:20 p.m. ET.

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Rory McIlroy’s Masters tears flowed for a different reason this time around

admin — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 04:59:36 +0000

AUGUSTA, Ga. — A year ago, Gerry and Rosie McIlroy were 4,000 miles away, at home in Northern Ireland, when their only child won his first Masters title and the career Grand Slam. This time around, Gerry and Rosie weren’t about to miss out again — but they were cutting it close. On a warm, still Sunday evening, as Rory was putting the finishing touches on what would be a one-shot win over world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, the McIlroys pulled up in a golf cart in front of Augusta National’s clapboard clubhouse.

With Rory’s handlers and Augusta National member and general man-about-golf Jimmy Dunne in tow, Gerry and Rosie entered the building, passed through a narrow foyer lined with renderings of Masters champions past — their son among them — and exited through a back door onto the lawn just behind the 18th green, which by this point was ringed with patrons 20 or 30 rows deep. Gerry was in black wing tips, dark pants and a polo emblazoned with the logo of Seminole Golf Club, the exclusive South Florida haunt to which he belongs; Rosie was in a colorful, flowy top and white capris. Their son was about to be in his second green jacket.

Knowing the winning moment was imminent, Dunne suggested that the McIlroys might be better off staying in the clubhouse and watching the telecast in the reception room. The group wheeled around, ducked back inside and gathered around a small computer monitor that was streaming the Masters.com feed. Rory, after a wayward tee shot on 18, was sizing up his options from the pine trees right of the fairway. He had a two-shot lead and was still very much in control of his fate, but still … for his parents it couldn’t have been easy to watch.

And they didn’t — not for long, anyway, because just a couple of minutes later, Gerry and Rosie were on the move again. Someone on Rory’s team had recommended that they start walking down to the area behind the 18th green where friends and family gather to greet the victor. The McIlroys exited the clubhouse for a second time, navigated the masses craning for a view of the action and positioned themselves for an embrace that had been a lifetime in the making.

***

The many sacrifices Gerry and Rosie made for their son have been well chronicled. As young Rory was taking to the game at Holywood Golf Club, in a suburb just east of Belfast, Gerry worked two jobs, as a locker-room attendant and bartender, while Rosie worked nights at a 3M factory. It wasn’t easy but it was necessary to support their son’s blossoming obsession: the lessons, the travel to competitions near and far, the lighted practice green in the yard behind their humble brick house. It was necessary for Rory to become Rory. “I’ll never be able to repay Mum and Dad for what they did,” Rory once said.

He has tried, though. Earlier this year, Rory took Gerry, a fine player in his own right, for a dream father-and-son spin around Augusta National, which marked Gerry’s first Augusta visit since Rory won there the previous April. They stopped at the spot on the par-5 15th from where Rory, in the fourth round of the 2025 Masters, hit a sublime drawing 7-iron; Rory dropped a ball and delivered another beauty. On the Sunday before this year’s Masters, Rory invited his father to play another round at Augusta — this time with Dunne and another Augusta member, entrepreneur Michael Walrath. Vibes were high. They were about to get much higher.

When McIlroy tidied up his winning bogey on the 18th green Sunday evening, the scene lacked some of the spine-tingling electricity from a year ago but still was not short on feels. After McIlroy hugged his caddie, Harry Diamond, and exchanged pleasantries with his playing partner, Cameron Young, he made his way to the roped-off channel behind the green where his family was waiting for him. The first squeeze went to his 5-year-old daughter, Poppy, who snuck under the rope line. Then came a kiss and a hug for wife Erica, who was hiding under a sun hat. Gerry and Rosie were next. Rory pulled them in close — Rosie under his left arm and Gerry under his right.

“Good thing you came!” the son said, beaming. “Good thing you came!”

Rory’s Tour pals were happy to see Rory’s parents, too. As Rory tended to his card in scoring inside the clubhouse, a swell of well-wishers gathered outside. Among them was Shane Lowry, who found Gerry and embraced him. So, too, did Tommy Fleetwood. Not that there was much time to loiter: the Green Jacket Ceremony beckoned. As Team McIlroy made the procession to the putting green where Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley would slide the coat on to Rory, Erica and Poppy led the charge. Gerry, who was in the parade behind them, laughed and said, “She’s experienced at this. She knows which way to go.”

From left, at the Green Jacket Ceremony: Harry Diamond; Gerry and Rosie McIlroy; Poppy and Erica McIlroy

getty images

***

When the proceedings began, the descending sun cast a lovely glow over Augusta National. Rory thanked the club and the staff and his “biggest supporters” in Erica and Poppy. Then he called out “Mum and Dad.”

“They weren’t here last year to celebrate with us last year, and surprisingly I had to convince them to come this year because they thought that the reason I won was because they weren’t here. So I’m glad that we proved that wrong.”

The crowd laughed.

“Mum and Dad,” Rory continued, looking at his parents, “I owe everything to you. You are, umm…”

Rory’s voice cracked. The crowd clapped. Rory wiped tears from his eyes.

“You’re the most wonderful parents,” he said. “And if I can be half the parent to Poppy as you were to me, then I know I’ve done a good job. Thank you.”

Later, when meeting with the press, Rory said that whenever he found himself thinking of his parents during the round, he squashed those thoughts. “I was like, ‘No, not yet, not yet,’” he said, adding, “It’s amazing to have them here. I’m excited to celebrate with them tonight.”

Gerry and Rosie were way ahead of him, over in Eisenhower Cabin, which is adjacent to the practice green on which their son had been presented the green jacket. As day was melting into night, Rory’s parents exited the cabin and began the walk to their next destination. The object in Gerry’s left hand indicated the party was well underway: a half-finished glass of beer.

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