Xander Schauffele

Schauffele has seven career PGA TOUR titles and the sixth came at this event last year. He's yet to successfully defend a title but he'll give it another shot this week. "You have good feelings and memories, and for whatever reason, us pros, you know, play well on courses or, you know, certain courses." The San Diego State product arrives with nine straight top-25 finishes so he's certainly playing steady golf. He currently sits just outside of the top 10 in the FedExCup race.

Schauffele was 4-over thru three holes at the last major (PGA Championship) but flipped that script entirely today. He had everything working today as he walked off the course ranked 7th or better in all four sub-categories of strokes gained. "It's kind of a mixed bag. I think the only place we were able to get away with a few mis-hits would be off the tee. Coming into greens, like you said, you need to be pretty clean. When I wasn't, I was still able to make birdie because I made some long putts so probably try and clean that up as the days go on." This is far from his first taste of success at the U.S.Open as he's now been T8 or better after round one in five of his seven appearances at the event. He's turned in top-15 finishes in all six of those previous starts with five doubling as top-7 finishes. 

Schauffele circled birdies 3 and 7 while overnight leader Wyndham Clark was slow out of the gate. "I wouldn't really put it on the driver, just I didn't do what I needed to do at important times. When you're trying to win on Sunday, you need to put the screws down and put some pressure on the guys leading and I didn't do that." The San Diego State product won three times in 2022 but still searching for his first win this year. On the bright side, Schauffele now has five straight top 10s and is trending ahead of the season's second major.

Schauffele circled five birdies and an eagle on the opening 15 holes to find himself with an early lead at Quail Hollow Club. The eagle came from 42'6" at the par-5 10th. He stumbled home with bogeys on two of the last three holes, including a water ball at the closing 18th. "I really had it going there. Ball was on a string for a bit, did everything really well. It's a championship-style golf course, so played really well through 15 holes and then had a little hiccup there coming in, so it is what it is." Schauffele arrived with back-to-back top 5s on his game log and he's not showing any sign of slowing down just yet.