Rory's timely delivery ahead of schedule

McIlroy outclasses field at Pebble Beach; Scheffler returns with the gory details

Rory McIlroy got the best of his Irish mate Shane Lowry at Pebble Beach (Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)

Professional men’s golf in general — and the PGA Tour in particular — needed a day like Sunday.

It needed a tournament like Pebble Beach and the varying weather conditions it delivered on the Monterrey Peninsula all weekend.

And it needed a plethora of big names to show up and perform.

Playing on the first weekend of 2025 without the specter of pro and college football looming over the proceedings, and coming on the back of all kinds of negative story lines — led by slow play and the ever-present discussions about making golf more compelling — the best tonic was Rory McIlroy.

Oh, McIlroy had a quality supporting cast, too. But having perhaps the game’s most compelling figure — with all apologies to Bryson DeChambeau — get a win so early in the year and playing some of the golf he played on an iconic venue goes a long way to put aside all the angst.

McIlroy, 35, shot a final-round 66 at Pebble Beach to defeat Shane Lowry — his Irish friend and teammate (Ryder Cup, Olympics and Zurich) — by two shots. Both Irishmen trailed another fellow European Ryder Cupper Sepp Straka, bidding for his second win of the year, by a stroke starting the final round.

The highlight of the day was the way McIlroy played the par-5 14th hole, where he blasted a tee shot 330 yards over the corner of the dogleg, and found the green with a 7-iron from 200 yards. He rolled in the 25-foot putt for eagle to extend a one-stroke lead and cruise home from there to his 27th career PGA Tour victory.

“Historically, I’ve started well in the Middle East and then I’d come to the West Coast and struggle a little bit,” said McIlroy, who finished fourth two weeks ago at the DP World Tour’s Hero Dubai Desert Classic. “To come straight from there and get a win — I think it’s only my second win in California. It’s really cool to get a win on the West Coast. Just a great start to the season and it sets me well for a run up to the Masters.”

His only previous West Coast victory, by the way, came 10 years ago at the WGC-Match Play at Harding Park in San Francisco.

To put McIlroy’s Pebble Beach win in perspective, he became the first player to reach 27 PGA Tour victories since Phil Mickelson reached that number in 2005 at the PGA Championship. Tiger Woods got to 27 wins in 2001.

It also marks the eighth straight season that McIlroy has won on the PGA Tour.

It’s simply an elusive number — McIlroy’s total breaks a tie with Hall of Famer Henry Picard and moves him to 22nd alone on the list of players with the most PGA Tour wins. And while we might expect that McIlroy will easily clear 30 PGA Tour wins and move into the top 15 all-time, he might be the last one to do so — at least until Scottie Scheffler (13 wins) gets more years under his belt. It’s an increasingly difficult feat.

At Pebble Beach, McIlroy led the field in strokes gained off the tee and was third in approach. The key was seventh in strokes gained putting, and that combination of putting, driving and ball-striking will always be difficult for others to overcome.

“He took control of the tournament,” said Lowry. “When I would make a birdie, he’d have a birdie back. He was in control of his ball today and he putted nicely. It all came together. He gets rid of the mistakes with his irons, he’s very hard to beat.”

There will be time to consider the long-term ramifications. McIlroy undoubtedly wants some form going into his next career-slam opportunity at tge Masters, which is still a good bit off (52 days). He’ll head back to Florida for TGL on Tuesday night and then return to California for the relocated Genesis Invitational at Torrey Pines before the Florida Swing run-up to Augusta.

That kind of performance on one of golf’s greatest stages goes a long way to putting golf’s other ills in the background.

“It’s been a great week for a lot of different reasons — hole-in-one, playing Cypress (Point) for the first time, obviously getting a win,” McIlroy said. “It’s been a really cool week. Obviously couldn’t wish for a better start for my PGA Tour season. I’ve been on a nice run of form since last fall. I’ve played some really good golf and continued that into this year. Just a great way to start the year.”

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Scottie Scheffler was glad to be back after his Christmas accident (Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

Scheffler Returns from Christmas Mishap

Scottie Scheffler was never really in contention on Sunday at Pebble Beach, and while that might be disappointing in the short term, it certainly was no problem in the big picture.

Not when you consider it was his first start of the year after a freak, yet scary, Christmas Day accident that saw him puncture the palm of his right hand, requiring surgery to remove broken glass.

It seems only a Louisville cop and Christmas dinner have been able to derail Scottie in recent times.

Scheffler, the No. 1-ranked player in the world who is the reigning Masters champ, played his first event of 2025 and shot a final-round 67 to finish tied for ninth, six strokes behind McIlroy. Perhaps there was a bit of rust to shake off but that was a strong performance nonetheless.

Coming into the week, Scheffler talked about the injury and what a fluke it was.

“So when you make raviolis, we wanted to make them from scratch so you’ve got to roll the dough and you’ve got to cut the dough, but we were at a rental house so we didn’t have the right tools and the only thing there was a wine glass that we found,” he said. “I had my hand on top of it and it broke, which side note, I’ve heard nothing but horror stories since this happened about wine glasses, so be careful.

“Even if you’re like me and you don’t drink wine, you’ve got to be real careful with wine glasses. Yeah, it broke and the stem kind of got me in the hand. So it’s one of those deals where like it’s truly — I can’t live in a bubble, like got to live my life and accidents happen. You know, it could have been a lot worse.”

Scheffler said he expected no long-term issues.

“Season debut, it’s a little weird making it this late in the year, but good to be back,” he said prior to the tournament. “Everything’s feeling good. It’s nice to be here at Pebble. Definitely excited to play. Feeling well rested. Overall feeling good.”

So far, so good. Now it’s on to the WM Phoenix Open (where he won in 2022 and ’23) and the Genesis Invitational at Torrey Pines to see just how quickly Scheffler can get back to being the guy who won nine times last year.

He doesn’t appear all that far off.