Welcome back to the Monday Finish, where we’re desperate for Tommy Fleetwood to pass us in PGA Tour wins. To the news!
Running it back.
Earlier this year it felt like the 2025 European Ryder Cup team would look significantly different than 2023.
That’s normal. Golf is a fickle game and two years can be a long time. Stuff happens. After all, in the offseason post-Rome Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton jumped ship for LIV Golf, throwing their eligibility into limbo. Ludvig Aberg got surgery and his form ebbed and flowed. Viktor Hovland admitted he felt lost. Matt Fitzpatrick admitted the same. And Justin Rose alternated brilliance with disappointment; this year he nearly won the Masters and then in six tournaments over the next two months he fared no better than T42.
But now, as we reach Ryder Cup team-picking time, the band seems to be coming back together.
Legal limbo means Rahm and Hatton will be eligible for this year’s team, no problem. Aberg is on the upswing; after a middling spring he’s finished T16 or better in four of his last seven starts. Hovland found enough form to win Valspar, contend at the U.S. Open and make every cut since the Players. Fitzpatrick showed signs with a top-10 at the PGA and then put together several strong starts in a row: T8 at the Rocket Classic, T4 at the Scottish, T4 at the Open, T8 at the Wyndham. And then Rose, who’d showed signs at the Scottish and the Open, did something special down the stretch this weekend in Memphis.
When he dunked one in the water at No. 9 on Sunday and made bogey it seemed like he was done; you can’t cede penalty shots to a leaderboard that includes the No. 1 player in the world. But Rose bounced back with birdie at No. 10. Still, his bogey at No. 12 again seemed to put him far back — but then he reeled off birdies at 14-15-16-17 to seize a share of the lead. He nearly birdied 18 for the outright win; he’d settle for making birdie on 18 on the second and third playoff holes to best J.J. Spaun and claim his first victory in more than two years. Now he’s an auto-qualifier for Team Europe. And it seems all but certain that 11 of the 12 teammates from that electric 2023 team will be back for 2025.
As for No. 12? That remains an open question. Nicolai Hojgaard was that 12th player in 2023; he’s still in the mix for the final spot this season despite missing the FedEx Cup playoffs, as he’s leading a contingent of last-gasp hopefuls at the Danish Championship this week. (Those other hopefuls: Nicolai’s twin brother Rasmus, who’s been in mixed form but remains No. 8 in the team standings, Matt Wallace, who’s No. 11 on that list, and then other dark-horse options in strong form like Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen and Kristoffer Reitan. Aaron Rai is out of the playoffs but still in the conversation at No. 53, while one other strong option, Harry Hall, will tee it up at this week’s BMW Championship. (The only other Euro to land a spot in the top 50 is Thomas Detry, whose runaway win at the WM Phoenix Open win feels like a very long time ago.) In short: 11 spots on Team Europe feel settled, while the final golden ticket feels very much up for grabs.
When Luke Donald took the helm in 2023 it was a changing of the guard; the era of Sergio Garcia, Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Henrik Stenson, Graeme McDowell and Paul Casey gave way in real time to McIlroy, Rahm, Fleetwood and the rest. Now it’s clear that wasn’t a one-off — it was the beginning of something special for Team Europe. Donald’s back for more and so is his electric squad, 45-year-old Rose included. We’re just one step closer to a rip-roaring weekend on Long Island next month. That’s golf stuff I like.
Who won the week?
Justin Rose won his way onto the Ryder Cup team, into another multi-year PGA Tour exemption, into the Tour Championship and into the hearts and minds of golf fans everywhere. And he proved that he’s been right, all these times he’s insisted on his readiness to win again. Good on ya, Rosey.
Dean Burmester won on the first playoff hole at LIV Chicago, beating out Jon Rahm and Josele Ballester in the process. The three had played in the same leaders’ group all day but it took a 19th-hole birdie from Burmester to seal the deal.
Grant Forrest won the DP World Tour’s Nexo Championship by four shots, a particularly meaningful victory given he was on home soil. The win was Forrest’s first in four years; his previous victory also came in Scotland at the 2021 Hero Open at Fairmont St. Andrews.
Christo Lamprecht won his first Korn Ferry Tour title, claiming the Pinnacle Bank Championship with a walk-off bunker shot at the last. The win came from nowhere; Lamprecht had started the year with two top-fours in his first three starts but had gone 11 consecutive events without a top 20 before Sunday’s win. Now he’s up to No. 10 in the Order of Merit and in position to secure his PGA Tour card for 2026.
