US Open: Oakmont gets better of big hitters but Sam Burns holds nerve to stay in hunt for first Major

Irish Times

a day ago

The body language of so many told their own tales, as the course known as The Beast lived up to its reputation in the second round of the
US Open
.
At Oakmont on Friday, there was no hiding place.
There were sights to behold, for sure.
Of
Scottie Scheffler
, the world number one, slamming his driver into the dry earth on the third tee box after a drive where his ball flew towards and into the church pews bunkering down the left.
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Or
Jon Rahm
, a former champion, putting his head into his hands in exasperation. Not an isolated occurrence, for it happened time and time again. On approach shots. After putts.
Or Justin Thomas – most especially after a four-putt double-bogey mid-round – looking for all the world like a lost soul when exiting the property.
Jon Rahm reacts after missing a chip on the first hole during the second round of the US Open at Oakmont. Photograph: Erik S Lesser/EPA
Dustin Johnson won the competition when it was last staged here in 2016. He won't be repeating the feat. Johnson cut a disconsolate figure as he signed for back-to-back 75s to miss out on the weekend.
Some rare joy was on display, too.
Victor Perez did that awkward jump and chest-to-chest bump thingy with his caddie, James Erkenbeck, after getting a hole-in-one on the sixth.
Sam Burns – bouncing back from a heartbreaking playoff defeat to Ryan Fox in the Canadian Open – high-fived caddies and players in his three-ball after a miraculous par save on the ninth, his closing hole. Pure and utter joy.
In near-perfect conditions, with only a breeze to pose any second thoughts on club selection, Burns, statistically the best putter on the PGA Tour this season, produced a magnificent 65 to add to his opening 72 to reach the midpoint on three-under-par 137.
This was another day when the mental and physical were tested, on a course where the stimpmeter ran closer to 15 than 14. The greens were lightning-fast and the rough had gone uncut after the first round. It gnarled and sucked in any loose shots.
The course was relentless for players from start to finish. While Burns navigated a route into contention, mere survival was on the minds of many – among them Scheffler – for a large part of the journey.
Scheffler, the US PGA champion and winner of three of his last four outings on the tour, did what he does. Apart from the occasional grimace and that driver slam into the dirt, he stuck to his task gamely to post a 71 for 144. He is playing catch-up heading into the weekend, but, unlike others, does so with the chance to make inroads.
'Any time I'm not playing up to my expectations, I think it's frustrating," said Scheffler. 'Mentally, this was as tough as I've battled for the whole day.
'There was a lot of stuff going on out there that was not going in my favour. I felt like Teddy (his caddie, Ted Scott) and I did a great job of battling, especially coming down the stretch. I'm four over, but around this golf course I don't think by any means I'm out of the tournament.'
Sam Burns makes his putt on the eighth hole during the second round of the US Open at Oakmont. Photograph:Rahm – never one to hide his emotions in good times or bad – shot a 75 to leave him four over par.
He said: 'I'm too annoyed and too mad right now to think about any perspective. Very frustrated. Very few rounds of golf I played in my life where I think I hit good putts and they didn't sniff the hole, so it's frustrating.'
Burns rose up the leaderboard with a display of patience and shot-making. He produced a round of 65 – six birdies and one bogey – for 137 over both days. It leaves him nicely positioned to push for a breakthrough Major. This season, he has managed three top-10s on the tour, his closest call coming in last week's sudden-death loss to Fox in Canada.
The six birdies conjured up by Burns were magical in their own way, yet the par save on the ninth was probably more important than any. His drive down the left found the hazard and, after dropping out, his approach was superbly struck to 22 feet.
'It's obviously a difficult hole,' said Burns. 'It's a blind tee shot kind of up the hill and I was trying to hit a fade off the left side and just pulled it a little bit. Then that putt was, I don't know, six feet of break. It was a nice one to make for sure."
Oakmont provides such a challenge, he says, that it's best just to go for it without overthinking shots.
He added: 'I think for this golf course, you really just have to free it up. It's too hard to try to guide it around here. You're going to hit some in the rough, you're going to hit some in some bad spots. You might as well do it with authority.'