Inside Texas Today: Texas-Ex Scottie Scheffler wins The Masters
Welcome to Inside Texas Today! Every weekday, Inside Texas Today will provide the latest from around the Forty Acres. This morning, recapping Scottie Scheffler’s victory in the 2022 Masters championship.
Here’s the Monday, April 11, 2022 edition.
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“Scheffler outshines them all!”
Scottie Scheffler, a former University of Texas golfer and the current No. 1 golfer in the Official World Golf Rankings, won the 2022 Masters Tournament over Rory McIlroy by three strokes with a score of 10-under par. His final 278 was buoyed by under-70 rounds of 69 and 67 on Thursday and Friday to help him become the third Longhorn to wear the green jacket.
Scheffler joins Ben Crenshaw (1984, 1995) and Jordan Spieth (2015) as Masters champions from UT, and becomes the sixth Longhorn to win a Major championship.
A graduate of Highland Park High School in Dallas, Texas, Scheffler played in the final grouping on Sunday with Cameron Smith, who entered the day trailing Scheffler by three strokes. Smith eventually fell out of contention with a triple-bogey six on the par-3 12th.
Scheffler remained consistent until the very end. He fired a two-under 34 on the first nine on Sunday, punctuated by a chip-in birdie on the third hole. He was one-under on the second nine entering No. 18. With the tournament essentially won ahead of his walk to the final green, a four-putt double-bogey on the 72nd hole made little difference in the final outcome. With his tap-in putt, Scheffler joined the storied group of golfers to win at Augusta National Golf Club.
His five-under, difference-making round on Friday had a shaky start, beginning bogey-birdie-bogey. Those would be his final bogies of the day, as he would record six more birdies to enter the weekend with a 36-hole lead. Scheffler made it to Sunday with a 54-hole lead despite struggles on the second nine on Saturday. He bogied four of the final seven holes, with two birdies and one par interspersed in, to shoot a 71.
The No. 1 ranking in the OWGR came as a result of one of the hottest streaks in golf seen in recent years. Scheffler has won four tournaments since the beginning of February, beginning with the WM Phoenix Open. He won the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill by one stroke, then topped Kevin Kisner to win the Dell Technologies Match Play in Austin.
Scheffler is one of 17 different former Longhorns to claim a win on the PGA TOUR. He was part of three Big 12 champion teams while at Texas.
