SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. – A lot has changed for Rory McIlroy since the last time he teed it up at Shinnecock Hills in a U.S. Open in 2018, and, luckily for McIlroy, his opening-round score at this golf course was one of those things.
McIlroy – who opened with an eye-opening 80 eight years ago at Shinnecock – was 11 shots better in the first round this year. He came into the house with a 1-under 69 despite a couple of stumbles in his final few holes.
“I think with the conditions today, anything under par or anything around even par is a good score,” McIlroy said.
When he finished, McIlroy was just one shot back of the lead held by Sam Stevens. The first round was delayed two hours due to fog, so the cadence of McIlroy’s day was thrown off. But he adjusted quickly and was 2 under through his first three holes.
McIlroy gave those birdies back with bogeys on Nos. 13 and 16 – the wind was so strong as he teed off on 13 his hat blew off when he completed his swing – but added another birdie on the par-4 3rd before making eagle on No. 5. That was McIlroy’s fourth eagle of his U.S. Open career – but first on a par five.
“I was trying to pitch the ball like 180, and I ended up pitching the ball like 190. I carried that pitching wedge 190 yards. It just shows how strong the wind is out there,” McIlroy said. “It’s nice to have a wedge in your hand with second shots on a par five, and with the greens still being receptive, I could get the ball to stop on that green (and) it was nice to hole the putt.”
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The hole in between the two scoring efforts was probably the key to his round Thursday, however. McIlroy hit a drive that went way left and then his approach went way right. From the fescue and in a testy lie next to the green, he pitched on to 18 feet and rolled in the par-saver.
That singular hole was a microcosm of how McIlroy’s game has matured at U.S. Opens.
He said Thursday, after he missed the cut at Shinnecock Hills in 2018, he went to the next week’s PGA Tour event and remembers being “so much” in his comfort zone and thinking to himself he had things backwards. He should have been in his comfort zone, he said, at the major.
“I remember flying back from Dubai at the end of 2018, and I would keep, like, a journal or a diary. I wrote in it that from 2019 going forward, I’m going to build my game to compete at the major championships and excel at the toughest tests that we have,” McIlroy said. “Working on the things that you need to do well to excel at (majors), which is flighting the ball, hitting your numbers, wedge play, short game, putting. Which is all the stuff that I feel like I’ve improved over the last few years.”
McIlroy has been inside the top 10 at the conclusion of the first round of a U.S. Open six times previously and converted each solid start into a top-10 finish come Sunday night. If he were to go on to win this week, he would become the seventh golfer in history to win the Masters and the U.S. Open in the same season, with Jordan Spieth 11 years ago being the last to do it.
After he did take the lead with his eagle, it was a tough finish for McIlroy, who bogeyed both Nos. 8 and 9 after two bad iron shots left him in tough spots to get up-and-down.
Alas, McIlroy said he was pleased with his start and on a quirky, delayed kind of day, shooting under par was something to be awfully pleased with.
“It was a day to really just keep yourself in the tournament and not shoot yourself out of it, which is exactly what I did eight years ago here,” McIlroy said. “Sort of went out with the mindset that pars were going to be good, and if you could pick up a couple of birdies here and there, that’s always a bonus. But really just minimizing the mistakes. I did that for the most part today.”
Some other notable scores from Thursday morning included a matching 1-under 69 from Ludvig Aberg – who played with McIlroy – and Ben James, who played his professional debut last week at the RBC Canadian Open. Keith Mitchell shot an even-par 70 but in an incredible way – he opened with a 41 on his first nine before shooting a 29 on his back nine. He is the only golfer in U.S. Open history to shoot 40 or worse on one nine and break 30 on the other nine within the same round, per stats guru Justin Ray.
Scottie Scheffler shot a 2-over 72 as he goes for the career grand slam for the first time.
Canadians Ben Silverman and Nick Taylor both shot 4-over 74.
Each Canadian had some highlights, but it was a tough day in particular for Silverman, who was, essentially, on the first tee before play was suspended earlier in the morning and had to do the entirety of his warm-up routine over again – including eating a second breakfast.