U.S. Open at Oakmont: Scheffler's favorite status, Mickelson's possible goodbye among early storylines

Oakmont Country Club, with its famous Church Pews bunker, devilish rough and fast greens, has gone nine years since last hosting the U.S. Open.

That wait ends now.

The world’s best golfers converge this week on arguably the world’s best course, a historic combination that certainly has frustrated some of the game’s greats through the years.

In 2016, four golfers broke par.

In 2007, nobody did.

Another stern test lies ahead at the 125th U.S. Open as Oakmont hosts the USGA event for a record 10th time. After three days of practice, the tournament rounds run Thursday-Sunday.

Golfing legends Jack Nicklaus, Ben Hogan and Johnny Miller were among those crowned U.S. Open champions at Oakmont. More recently, Dustin Johnson celebrated in 2017 at a respectable 4-under. Angel Cabrera won the 2007 title at 5-over.

On which side of par will this year’s winner finish?

The early favorites

As winners of this year’s first two majors, PGA champion Scottie Scheffler and Masters champ Rory McIlroy are the U.S. Open favorites. But the two superstars enter this third major with drastically different mojo.

Scheffler is the hottest golfer on tour, having won three of his past four starts. In contrast, McIlroy has stumbled into the U.S. Open by tying for 47th at the PGA Championship and missing the cut at the RBC Canadian Open.

Still, betting sites give them the best odds to win.

Scheffler shored up his spot as the world’s top-ranked golfer by winning the Byron Nelson, the PGA Championship and the Memorial, all since May 4. None was particularly close, either. He won by eight, five and four strokes.

The 28-year-old now has three major titles, having also won the Masters twice (2024, ’22). Scheffler’s best showings at the U.S. Open were a tie for second in 2023 and a third-place finish in 2022.

McIlroy started the season strong by winning the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and The Players Championship before earning his first green jacket at the Masters in mid-April. The major tournament victory was his first since 2014 and completed a career grand slam.

The 36-year-old from Northern Ireland is making his 17th start in the U.S. Open, which he won in 2011. He finished as the tournament runner-up the past two years, giving him eight top 10s overall.

However, McIlroy has had trouble finding the fairway as of late. He hit only 13 of 26 fairways off the tee this past week in Toronto. His struggles coincided with a switch in drivers before the PGA Championship, reportedly after routine USGA testing found his previous club was nonconforming.

Scheffler later said his driver also failed testing that same weekend, requiring him to change clubs as well.

Neither has good memories of the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont. Scheffler finished 7-over, McIlroy was 8-over and both missed the cut.

Chasing history

Defending U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau has a chance to accomplish a feat neither Nicklaus nor Tiger Woods ever could.

That is win the U.S. Open in back-to-back years.

Only two golfers in the past 74 years have done it: Curtis Strange (1988-89) and Brooks Koepka (2018-19). DeChambeau won last year’s U.S. Open by shooting a 7-under 274 at Pinehurst No. 2.

He arrives at Oakmont as a serious contender after posting top-five finishes at this year’s first two majors. He tied for fifth at the Masters and tied for second at the PGA Championship.

Already a two-time U.S. Open champion, DeChambeau won his first in 2020 at Winged Foot. He tied for 26th a year later at Torrey Pines in his first title defense.

DeChambeau has played well in the LIV Golf League this year, where he ranked second in points after seven events. The 31-year-old recently got an up-close look at Oakmont and shared video of his practice round online, marveling at times at the course’s dense rough. He tied for 15th in the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont.

In all, seven golfers have repeated as the U.S. Open champion since the first tournament in 1895. The others were Ben Hogan (1950-51), Ralph Guldahl (1937-38), Bobby Jones (1929-30), John McDermott (1911-12) and Willie Anderson (1903-05), the only golfer to win three in a row.

Old course, new look

This isn’t the same course as nine years ago.

Oakmont Country Club underwent noticeable changes since the U.S. Open last visited thanks to Philadelphia-based architect Gil Hanse, who led a restoration effort two years ago. He returned some holes to earlier layouts.

In a Q&A interview with the USGA, Hanse said his restoration team didn’t turn the clock back to a specific year. Instead, they looked at various photographs from when the Fownes family still oversaw the course and chose the best option for each individual hole.

“Look at the first hole,” Hanse said. “In our opinion, for the modern game, the 1927 iteration was the best version. And then maybe the 1935 iteration was the best version for the second hole.”

Hanse noted how some greens were expanded — such as No. 13 — where a ridge “cuts into the green from the right-hand side” to provide a new back hole location. The restoration also added a little length to the course and reworked or eliminated some bunkers.

The USGA noted Hanse, nicknamed the “Open Doctor,” led renovations at many U.S. Open courses, including Winged Foot and the Los Angeles Country Club, among others.

Lefty’s last U.S. Open?

Six-time major champion Phil Mickelson could say goodbye to the U.S. Open.

The 54-year-old has acknowledged that this U.S. Open — his 34th — could be his last. His five-year qualifying exemption earned by winning the 2021 PGA Championship expires after this year.

“There’s a high likelihood that it will be, but I haven’t really thought about it too much,” he told reporters last week.

Mickelson has won all three other majors, meaning this might be his last chance to complete the career grand slam. But “Lefty” hasn’t fared well in majors since his PGA Championship win. He has missed four straight U.S. Open cuts.

Mickelson finished second at the U.S. Open six times but was never in contention in three appearances at Oakmont. His best finish here was a tie for 47th in 1994. He famously called the Oakmont rough “dangerous” after missing the cut in 2007 and missed the cut again in 2016.

Now playing in the LIV Golf League, Mickelson was the U.S. Open runner-up in 2013, ’09, ’06, ’04, ’02 and 1999.

Cranberry native qualifies

Not everybody in the field is a well-known pro. Included in the 156 golfers are 16 amateurs, with Cranberry native Matt Vogt among them.

Vogt, now a dentist near Indianapolis, earned his way into U.S. Open as medalist at a qualifying event June 2 in Walla Walla, Wash. A winner of Indiana PGA events, Vogt shot a pair of 4-under 68s to qualify.

An added layer to Vogt’s homecoming story is that the 34-year-old caddied at Oakmont in his younger years.

And he’s not the only amateur with a unique story.

Consider, Mason Howell, a 17-year-old high school student from Georgia, is also among the amateurs headed to Oakmont. Howell tied for first at a qualifying event in Atlanta to earn his spot. Among those Howell bested were two-time major champion Zach Johnson and 2011 Players Championship winner K.J. Choi.

The U.S. Open honors the Low Amateur each year, an award won last season by Central Catholic graduate Neal Shipley. Shipley, who turned pro after tying for 26th, fell short in qualifying this year.

Record-breaking hole

Will the longest par 3 in U.S. Open history break its own record?

The eighth hole played at a record 300 yards during the 2007 tournament before being scaled back to 299 yards in 2016. However, in the run-up to this event, USGA chief championships officer John Bodenhamer offered a “promise” that the hole would play at record-breaking 301 yards at some point this year.

Understandably, it’s not everyone’s favorite.

Hole No. 8 allowed only 24 birdies in 2016, compared to 132 bogeys and 12 double bogeys.