As the first day of the 2024 Presidents Cup came to a close outside Montreal, the real rain clouds were long gone but the players on the International team seemed to have ones of the comic-strip variety, big ones, directly overhead.
Once again, in this competition dating to 1994 between the United States and golfers from around the world other than Europe, the Americans had the upper hand. Although none of the five matches were routs—three went to Royal Montreal’s 18th hole, one to the 17th and the last finished on No. 16—there was a sense as the afternoon progressed that the host squad was, as Bobby Jones put it so well many years ago, “a dogged victim of inexorable fate.”
Amid the numerical closeness of the contests existed a sense that the Internationals weren’t going to be able to get it done—that regardless of the unity and passion created by the “shield” concocted five years ago for the golfers from different countries and cultures around the globe, an emblem doesn’t make putts in pressure situations.
The Internationals failed to make those putts on the back nine on Thursday, and those missed opportunities made it likely that, barring a sizable comeback that better begin Friday, before the back nine on Sunday a predictable outcome—an American victory like that in 12 of the 14 previous Presidents Cups—will be the case.
Christiaan Bezuidenhout typified what went wrong for the Internationals, missing three seven-foot putts in a four-hole span just when he and Taylor Pendrith needed one or more of them to drop in a contest against Keegan Bradley and Wyndham. Instead, it was Bradley, at 38 years old the oldest player on the American team, sinking his share, including a 19-footer on the 18th hole to seal a 1-up victory.
It wasn’t just putting that brought the Internationals down. They failed to get off to a hot start in this home game, too often didn’t find the fairway off the tee, and weren’t able to generally apply much pressure on their opponents.
“Chef cooked. We ate.” That was Collin Morikawa’s caption on an Instagram photo, poking some fun at Min Woo Lee’s “Let him cook” catchphrase, after Morikawa and Sahith Theegala beat Lee and Adam Scott, 1 up. This is Scott’s 11th Presidents Cup, his longevity evidenced in the fact that Lee was his 17th different partner. Scott, too, went cold with the putter at key moments down the stretch.
The Americans’ 5-0 sweep in four-balls was the fifth time in the event’s history that a team won every match in a session. Before Thursday, the U.S. had done it in 1994, 2000 and 2007, with the Internationals accomplishing the feat in 2003, the year of the tie in South Africa.
One of the five wins was sweeter than the others. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler had gone winless (0-5-3) in Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup play since beating Jon Rahm in singles in 2021 at Whistling Straits. Scheffler and Cup newcomer Russell Henley beat Tom Kim-Sungjae Im, 3 and 2 in a match in which pals Scheffler and Kim—who share a birthday and play a lot of golf together when they’re off the tour back home in Texas—jawed and exulted at each other on the front nine.
Kim celebrated enthusiastically after sinking a 27½ -footer on the seventh hole. Then Scheffler matched him from just a bit closer and showed more emotion than even when he was winning a major or charging to victory at the Olympics with a closing 62.
“What was that?” Scheffler shouted.
After making birdie on the eighth, Kim made another birdie and again went wild. The young South Korean then stepped on etiquette norms by walking to the ninth tee before Scheffler attempted his birdie putt, which he missed to allow Kim-Im to pull within 1 down.
“It’s all in good fun,” Scheffler said afterward. “We enjoy competing against each other … and at the end of the match you take your hat off and shake hands. We’re friends after, we’re not friends during, I guess. “
On the 10th, Scheffler was first to hole a long birdie putt, then Kim topped him as they flipped the script from No. 7. Later, it was Henley with key birdies on the 14th and 15th to lead the partnership as Scheffler broke his Cup drought and deflated Kim, who was the sparkplug for the Internationals in 2022 at Quail Hollow.
“To be fair to them walking off, I did scream at them on the hole,” Scheffler said. “I’m not going to say it was their fault, you know what I mean?”
Scheffler was in a much different mood than he had been last fall at the Ryder Cup in Rome, when he went 0-2-2, one of the defeats a record 9-and-7 loss with Brooks Koepka that had him in tears.
There was no such sadness Thursday for the Americans. Their dream start might not have locked up this Presidents Cup, but they have their hands on the deadbolt.