Oakmont course to test the patience of the best golfers at U.S. Open

OAKMONT, Pa. — The main character at the 125th U.S. Open isn’t one of the players, but the course itself.

When the likes of World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler and defending champion Bryson DeChambeau call it, to some extent, the hardest course they’ll ever play, people sit up and pay attention.

Oakmont Country Club will test the patience of the best professionals and amateurs in golf when it hosts its record-extending 10th U.S. Open, beginning Thursday.

“It’s not like every single hole is Winged Foot out here,” said DeChambeau, who won his first U.S. Open there in 2020 before outlasting Rory McIlroy last year at Pinehurst No. 2. “You can’t just bomb it on every single hole and blast over bunkers and have a wedge run up to the front of the green.

“I think with this golf course you have to be just a fraction more strategic, especially with the rough being so long. I’m going to be as fearless as I can possibly be out there, I know that.”

Coming off a win at LIV Golf Korea and a top-five finish at LIV Golf Virginia, DeChambeau is in fine form. So is Scheffler, winner of the PGA Championship and the Memorial Tournament.

Even the best golfer in the world cringes a bit thinking about the rough at Oakmont, grown past five inches in length.

“When you miss the green at the Masters, the ball runs away and it goes into these areas, and you can play a bump, you can play a flop. There’s different options,” Scheffler said. “Here, when you hit the ball over the green, you just get in some heavy rough, and it’s like, ‘Let me see how I can pop the ball out of this rough and somehow give myself a look.'”

USGA commissioner Mike Whan said Wednesday that 1,385 golfers have played a major at Oakmont, and a grand total of 27 finished under par.

That includes Dustin Johnson, the most recent winner here when he shot 4 under in 2016. Three players tied for second at 1 under. Other champions at Oakmont include Ernie Els of South Africa, Johnny Miller, Jack Nicklaus and Ben Hogan.

Given the state of the rough and the fast-moving greens, it’s a bad time to be struggling off the tee, yet that’s where McIlroy finds himself.

The World No. 2 from Northern Ireland revealed that he carded an 81 on a scouting trip to Oakmont last week. His driver failed a conformance test at the PGA Championship — as did Scheffler’s — essentially because their age had made their faces too springy.

McIlroy used a backup driver at the PGA and tried a newer model at the RBC Canadian Open to disastrous results, missing the cut at 9 over. He’s back to an older model this week and downplayed it having an outsized effect on his overall game.

“It wasn’t a big deal for Scottie (at the PGA), so it shouldn’t have been a big deal for me,” McIlroy said.

Fifteen amateurs are in the field, and the star among them is Matt Vogt, a former Oakmont caddie who’s now a practicing dentist in Indianapolis. Vogt called it a “pipe dream” to make it this far.

“The old caddie shack used to be like right behind the range, where the new range is here. I don’t think it’s there anymore,” Vogt said. “… Yeah, I’m proud to be representing the caddie yard this week for sure, no matter how things go.”

The youngest player in the field is 17-year-old Mason Howell, while the oldest is Phil Mickelson, who’s reached the end of a five-year exemption for winning the 2021 PGA Championship. Mickelson, who turns 55 Monday, remains a U.S. Open shy of the career Grand Slam.

“There’s a high likelihood that it will be (his last U.S. Open), but I haven’t really thought about it too much,” Mickelson acknowledged last week.

Men’s golf hasn’t seen a first-time major champion since 2023. Jon Rahm of Spain, Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele, Justin Thomas and DeChambeau are all tied with two titles, all coming this decade except for Thomas’ first PGA Championship.

“It’s going to be a challenge,” said Rahm, who was the low amateur at Oakmont in 2016. “A lot of unfortunate things are going to happen. It’s hard fairways to hit, bad lies, difficult bunkers, difficult greens. It’s going to be a nice test, a difficult test. And I think one of the truest representations of what a U.S. Open is all about.”

–Adam Zielonka, Field Level Media