Current DP World Tour Rankings in partnership with Rolex leader Rory McIlroy could not have scripted a better dress rehearsal heading into this week’s U.S. Open after successfully defending his RBC Canadian Open crown.
The two-time DP World Tour Championship winner was at his very best at St George’s Golf Course to seal a 21st PGA Tour triumph and put him firmly in contention to build on his legacy and challenge for a fifth Major Championship title at The Country Club, Brookline.
“I hope I’m still building on my legacy,” McIlroy said.
“In golfing terms, I’m still youngish. Even though I’ve been out here for a long time, I’ve basically spent half my life on tour at this point. It’s very important to me. It means a lot, going back to history and tradition and putting your name on trophies that have the legends of the game on them.”
After finishing second and eighth at the Masters and U.S. PGA Championship respectively, it seems a Major drought dating back to the 2014 Open Championship at Royal Liverpool could soon be broken by the three-time DP World Tour Rankings champion.
The Northern Irishman will be cognisant that half of the past eight DP World Tour Rankings (formerly Race to Dubai) champions won at least one Major title in the year they were crowned European Number One; McIlroy captured the PGA and Open in 2014 to seal the second of his three European Number One titles.
Two more multiple winners of the DP World Tour Championship are also looking to build on their ranking with 2019 European Number One and defending U.S. Open champion Jon Rahm hoping for a repeat of last year’s heroics in a bid to climb from his current DP World Tour Ranking of 79th.
Matt Fitzpatrick, winner of the DP World Tour Championship in 2016 and 2020, will return to the scene of one of his greatest victories with the in-form Englishman hoping to draw on inspiration from his 2013 US Amateur Championship success and challenge for a maiden Major title at Brookline.
The 27-year-old came close to a first piece of Major silverware at last month’s U.S. PGA Championship, finishing two adrift of eventual champion Justin Thomas, who is ranked second in the DP World Tour Rankings.
The American will play the opening 36 holes at The Country Club in the company of Tony Finau and Viktor Hovland who won the second of this season’s five premier Rolex Series events, the Slync.io Dubai Desert Classic, in a play-off over Englishman Richard Bland at Emirates Golf Club in January.
Offering 10,000 points with 1,665 promised to the eventual winner, the third Major of the year again shapes as a critical week in the DP World Tour’s season-long quest to find Europe’s Number One golfer.
Only the season-ending DP World Tour Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates from November 17-20, 2022 offers more points – 12,000 with 2000 going to the winner.
Rolex Series tournaments offer 8000 Race to Dubai Ranking points with 1335 points going to the champions. Like Hovland, Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship winner Thomas Pieters has won a Rolex Series gold star this year and cannot be discounted at Brookline.
American Will Zalatoris is currently fourth in the DP World Tour Rankings and has proven himself something of a specialist in the Majors having rattled off cut, T6, 2nd, T8, cut, WD, T6 and 2nd placings in his eight starts in the game’s biggest events thus far.
Technically any player down to Lucas Herbert – in 62nd place on 329.2 points – could finish the week as the new DP World Tour Rankings leader but that would require the Aussie to win and for a lot of big names to miss the cut, an unlikely scenario given the recent form of McIlroy and co.