Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Koepka, Thomas look for comforts of home
PALM BEACH GARDENS — Brooks Koepka and Justin Thomas, the two highest-ranked golfers participating in their hometown tournament this week at the Honda Classic, have quite contrasting memories at The Champion Course at PGA National Resort & Spa.
Thomas, the Jupiter resident who is ranked as the No. 3 golfer in the world, enters defending last year’s title. Koepka, the West Palm Beach native and Cardinal Newman grad ranked fourth, comes back after missing the event last year with a wrist injury and failing to make the cut in 2017.
For Koepka, who shot 9-over after two rounds in 2017, he’s ready to put past transgressions in Palm Beach Gardens behind him.
“I haven’t had the best memories here. I was going through a bunch of stuff off the golf course two years ago, and then last year not being able to play, so I’ve tried to put that all in the past and tied to move on,” Koepka said following his Wednesday pro-am round ahead of the Honda Classic, which runs from Thursday through Sunday.
“And really, I like this golf course, so I mean, I think it suits me really well. Especially with the firm greens now, I think I’ve got a good chance.”
The 28-year-old Koepka, who played collegiately at Florida State, has proved resilient since the rough go at it in Palm Beach Gardens two years ago. He has won the last two U.S. Opens and, in recovering from that partially torn tendon in his wrist, added a 2018 PGA Championship. He became the first golfer to win the U.S. Open and PGA Championship in same year since Tiger Woods in 2000 and was named 2018 PGA Tour Player of the Year.
“I always had the confidence,” said Koepka, whose major championships account
for three of his five PGA Tour victories. “I wasn’t lacking that. I feel like I’m borderline cocky when it comes to that, but everybody out here should expect to win.
“Every time you win, you’re going to build confidence, and if you’re on a nice little run like I was, you’re going to have a lot of it, and I feel like I’m still riding on high on that and I’ve just been waiting for this South Florida swing for a while.”
Thomas, who already has nine PGA Tour victories under his belt at 25 and last year won a suddendeath playoff over Luke List for the win at PGA National, looks forward to making more memories in Palm Beach Gardens.
“Anytime that you can come back to a place that you’ve won and had success at, it’s enjoyable, it’s refreshing, I guess you can say,” said Thomas, who attended the University of Alabama and moved to Jupiter from Louisville. “It was a very emotional win. It kind of took a lot out of us and started a nice little stretch of golf. Hopefully we can kind of pick up some of those vibes from last year.”
Thomas will have to adjust to some changes after Wednesday was his first day back on the course since Sunday of last year.
“The golf course is definitely a lot different,” he said. “Fairways are very,
very soft. Greens are firm, being new. They’re rolling very true. It looked like they did a little bit of tweaking to some of the greens, so it was great to see it.”
While Koekpa, Thomas and world No. 9 Rickie Fowler, another Jupiter resident who won the Honda in 2017, headline this year’s participants with three players ranked in the top 10, fewer top golfers than in years past entered due to PGA schedule changes. Most recently, Tiger Woods announced last week he wouldn’t make it.
“It’s a shame because there’s such a great stretch of tournaments and it’s just not possible to play all of them,” Thomas said. “I know it’s unfortunate for this event that just the time and schedule have a lot of people that always play that just can’t play this year.
“There’s so many great tournament[s] on the PGA Tour that we just can’t play all of them. At the end of the day, although we have respect for that tournament director, that tournament, that course, we have to think about ourselves, our body and what is going to produce our best golf.”
Among other players of local interest participating this week are Delray Beach resident Gary Woodland, Dwyer High grad Daniel Berger and St. Thomas Aquinas grad Jason Dufner.