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Ben Griffin, Andrew Novak team up to win Zurich Classic for their first PGA Tour wins

Ben Griffin, Andrew Novak team up to win Zurich Classic for their first PGA Tour wins

USA Today28-04-2025

Ben Griffin, Andrew Novak team up to win Zurich Classic for their first PGA Tour wins
Winning on the PGA Tour hasn't been easy for Andrew Novak and Ben Griffin. In their 100th and 89th Tour event respectively, they finally took care of business in the Big Easy, winning the 2025 Zurich Classic of New Orleans on Sunday by one stroke over Nicolai and Rasmus Hojgaard.
Novak and Griffin birdied the 71st hole to break a tie and closed in 1-under 71 in the foursomes format at TPC Louisiana in Avondale, Louisiana, for a 72-hole total of 28-under 260. Griffin pumped his fist and then searched for his caddie and partner for the celebration.
"The reaction said it all," Griffin said.
The Zurich Classic is a 72-hole stroke play format featuring four-ball (best ball) during the first and third rounds and foursomes (alternate shot) during the second and final rounds.
Griffin and Novak held the 54-hole lead by three strokes but bogeyed three holes on the front nine and had to grind out victory on the back nine.
The winning duo, who have played a lot of golf together over the years as residents of Saint Simons Island, Georgia, bogeyed the first but bounced back with a birdie at the second. Novak rammed in a 47-foot birdie putt at the fifth to stretch the lead back to three strokes. But they had to sit out a 93-minute weather delay due to lightning.
When play resumed, Griffin and Novak missed an 18-foot par putt at No. 8 and followed with another bogey at nine, shrinking their lead to one at the turn and Capan and Knapp caught them with a birdie at 10.
It was down to wire with three teams duking it out late on Sunday for the title. The team of identical brothers from Denmark – Nicolai and Rasmus Hojgaard – trailed by a stroke and needed to make something happen at 18. It looked over when Rasmus blew his tee shot left and couldn't do better than birdie for a 68.
Frankie Capan III and Jake Knapp shared the lead and had the honor at the 183-yard par-3 17th. They hadn't made a bogey all day until Capan, a 25-year-old rookie, tugged his tee shot into the water and the best they could do was salvage bogey. They closed in 70 and finished third.
Novak stepped up next and his tee shot hit left of the hole and barely stayed dry, hanging on to the fringe. Novak spread his right hand across his heart as CBS's Trevor Immelman noted, 'My heart skipped a beat.' It soared again when Griffin poured in a 35-foot birdie putt to build a two-stroke lead.
"The wheels were coming off and I was having some issues out of the weather delay but we kept it together and that putt on 17 was unbelievable," Novak said.

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Jon Rahm: Smaller fields make top 10s easier at LIV Golf
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Jon Rahm: Smaller fields make top 10s easier at LIV Golf

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Jon Rahm: Smaller fields make top 10s easier at LIV Golf
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Jon Rahm: Smaller fields make top 10s easier at LIV Golf

Associated Press OAKMONT, Pa. (AP) — Two-time major champion Jon Rahm comes into the U.S. Open off another top 10 at LIV Golf, which is nothing new. The Spaniard has never come in lower in the 20 events he has finished since joining the Saudi-backed league at the start of last year. Is that a big deal? 'I would happily trade a bunch of them for more wins, that's for sure,' said Rahm, who has two LIV victories but has yet to win this year. 'But I keep putting myself in good position.' One of the criticism of LIV is the 54-man fields over 54 holes, especially with a half-dozen or more considered past their prime and several unproven young players. Rahm delivered some context on his streak. 'Listen, I'm a realist in this case,' he said. 'I've been playing really good golf, yes, but I'd be lying if I said that it wasn't easier to have top 10s with a smaller field. That's just the truth, right? Had I been playing full-field events, would I have top 10 every single week? 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I see the value in what they can provide, and I believe we'll come to some sort of resolution on that,' DeChambeau said Tuesday. 'Super excited for the future.' LIV contracts are confidential and there has been ample speculation whether the Public Investment Fund will shell out the kind of signing bonuses that helped lure players away from the PGA Tour in 2022. Meanwhile, unification with the PGA Tour and LIV Golf appears at a standstill as PIF officials want any future to include team golf. 'I think that LIV is not going anywhere,' DeChambeau said. He said Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the PIF governor behind the rival league, 'has been steadfast in his belief on team golf, and whether everybody believes in it or not, I think it's a viable option.' DeChambeau believes LIV is going in the right direction and referenced the indoor tech-infused TGL as having teams making money. 'I believe there is a sustainable model out there,' he said. 'How it all works with the game of golf, who knows? But I know my worth.' Xander and YouTube Xander Schauffele might spend less time on his phone than anyone, usually only scrolling through the news. A few weeks ago at the Memorial, during a rapid-fire series of random questions, he was asked who he would take with him on 'The Amazing Race' reality show. 'What's 'The Amazing Race,'' he asked. So when he was told about Tommy Fleetwood's latest venture with YouTube and asked if he would considering doing something like that, Schauffele replied, 'Is that like a serious question?' But he has spent time on YouTube for a reason. Schauffele made his U.S. Open debut in 2017, the year after the Open at Oakmont. What better way to check out the course than watching a U.S. Open at Oakmont? 'I watched some of the '16 coverage on YouTube. I would have watched it on any platform that would have been provided, but I watched some of that coverage there just to see sort of how guys were hitting shots and how the ball was reacting,' Schauffele said. Turns out that wasn't his first experience on YouTube. 'I've been in dark places where I've looked up swing tip things on YouTube as well, trying to make sense of it, just like every golfer has. I'll confess to it,' he said. "I'm luckily not there anymore, which is probably healthy for myself and my family. 'Yeah, there's a lot on there, I can tell you that much.' Rory and his driver Rory McIlroy expressed concern about his driver after badly missing the cut in the Canadian Open, his last tournament ahead of the U.S. Open. He said he worked at home over the weekend and realized he was using the wrong driver. And he was coy about which one he was using, suggesting that people could always go to the range to find out for themselves. McIlroy got plenty of attention with his driver when it was leaked at the PGA Championship that his driver did not pass inspection. It's a common occurrence, and testing takes place randomly at every major. 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'And I don't use very many, either.' ___ AP golf:

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