Schauffele welcomes new scenery
Xander Schauffele has to get used to his surroundings in a hurry.
The world No. 12 is making his debut this week at TPC Craig Ranch in the Dallas suburb of McKinney, Texas, home to AT&T Byron Nelson.
And he’s played Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma, home next week to the 104th PGA Championship, just once.
And that was an amateur event more than a decade ago
Is he worried about his lack of experience?
Not exactly.
“It can be (a challenge),” Schauffele said Tuesday at TPC Craig Ranch. “I feel like if you can kind of get your game in a good place it almost sometimes helps. If your game’s in a good place, your (caddie) tells you to hit it at that tree and you hit it right at that tree and you don’t know about any trouble around.
“So there’s pros and cons to knowing a lot about a course and playing really well and not knowing it. I haven’t been one to really travel out to major championships too much prior. I feel like I try to get in on Sunday and play nine holes each day, with no pro-am in those events, and usually playing two rounds of 18 is enough to sort of feel comfortable.”
The last time Schauffele played, he and Patrick Cantlay certainly looked comfortable, the Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup partners teaming up to win the Zurich Classic of New Orleans three weeks ago.
Schauffele was going to play in last week’s Wells Fargo Championship at TPC Potomac at Avenal Farm north of Washington, D.C., but he was a bit under the weather, so he headed to the Lone Star State.
“I’ve gone the route of playing no golf leading into majors and just practicing and trying to get ready for the event and then I played well doing both,” Schauffele said. “Just felt like I needed to get some reps in before next week and sort of a stretch of golf. So here I am.”
It’s been a so-so year for Schauffele. Actually, a so-so two years considering his standards. While he’s missed just two cuts in nine starts, they came in the year’s biggest events to this point – the Players Championship and the Masters.
Schauffele usually comes up big on the game’s grandest stages – he has nine top 10s in 19 starts in majors, including finishing in a tie for second behind Tiger Woods in the 2019 Masters and finishing in a tie for second behind Francesco Molinari in the 2018 Open Championship.
Among his four individual Tour titles are the 2017 Tour Championship, 2018 WGC-HSBC Champions and the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions.
And he won the gold medal in the 2021 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
The Sentry Tournament of Champions, however, was his last individual Tour title.
“It’s been a kind of a funky deal for me year-wise,” he said. “A lot of my statistics are fine, everything’s pretty mellow, just haven’t really put anything together during a week. So it was cool to sort of get things going with Pat there (in New Orleans).
I don’t even know what that really, you know, doesn’t count for everything, I guess, and for me, it’s not like an individual win, but it’s a good start and I’m not complaining at all, it was an awesome week.”
He hopes his form that week travels well for two weeks.
While Schauffele is hoping to get right, one player who is in a comfortable groove heading into the week is world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who lives a short drive from Craig Ranch.
When asked what Schauffele has seen from Scheffler this year, his answer was simple.
“A lot of good golf,” Schauffele said. “He’s staying at home, which is always a nice thing for us to do since we travel so much. I imagine him being very comfortable, which is a dangerous place for the current world No. 1 and, yeah, he’s just the same guy. He’s very playful, practices really hard, you’re always going to see Scottie out there chipping or putting pretty late in the day.
“So I’m not surprised that he’s been winning so much and playing great golf.”