Welcome to the Presidents Cup, Nick Taylor.
And heading into the weekend, the International Team will take a hearty lead over the powerhouse Americans after a shocking Friday effort.
Taylor and fellow Canadian Corey Conners defeated world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler and Sam Burns 1 up in Taylor’s Presidents Cup debut while Geoff Ogilvy’s squad ended up sweeping the session 5-0 and will head into the weekend leading 7-3.
Taylor hit his final drive on 18 well right, forcing Conners to punch out into the middle of the fairway. But the five-time PGA Tour winner stepped up, as he so often has done in his career, and nearly jarred his approach before it ended up just two feet away.
That final putt was conceded and when Burns’ birdie try lipped out, the Canadian duo had clinched another point for the Internationals.
“It was awesome,” Taylor said. “I got to get some of the feels yesterday watching, and to get the captains to have faith in me to play today (and) Corey played awesome. It’s fun hitting his approach shots after the way he drives it.
“We just played really solid and hung in there until the end.”
This year marks Conners’ third Presidents Cup appearance and he’s struggled in the biennial team competition in the past with a 2-8 record prior to Friday. But Taylor and Conners’ games are extremely complementary — not to mention their personalities — and this was a no-brainer pairing for Ogilvy.
“It’s pretty incredible to play on this stage with one of your best friends on the PGA Tour and fellow Canadian,” Conners said. “I’ve got a lot of trust in Nick’s game, and I know he steps up when it matters most, and he certainly did that today. So it was a blast to share the experience with him.”
On paper the match against Scheffler and Burns was lop-sided towards the Americans but the decision to send Conners and Taylor out first paid off. They earned the second point of the day for the Internationals after Hideki Matsuyama and Sungjae Im defeated Russell Henley and Jacob Bridgeman 3 and 2.
It was a bit of a turbulent start for the Canadian duo with Conners missing an 11-foot putt on No. 1 before nearly hitting it out of bounds on No. 2, leading to the Americans taking an early lead. Conners redeemed himself by hitting his approach to just two feet on No. 3 to get the match back to tied before Scheffler hit his approach in tight on the next hole to give the Americans the lead again.
The Canadian pair made back-to-back birdies on Nos. 5 and 6 and didn’t give up the lead again, with Taylor making clutch birdie putts on both No. 7 and No. 12.
“Any point on the board is huge in this event. It was just awesome to get to put the point on the board with Nick today,” Conners said. “We certainly beat some pretty good opponents. A little bit unfortunate there with the putt lipping out there for them on 18, but we battled hard, and it was a lot of fun.”
Taylor, at 38, may be a rookie on the scoresheet ledger but his top-dog experience shone through Friday — and he did exactly what he was asked to do when Ogilvy made him a captain’s pick.
“I’ve got a lot of faith in Nick’s game,” Conners said, “I know he’s going to step up when it matters.”
The rest of the International side also did their jobs through Friday’s foursomes affair at Medinah Country Club.
Ryan Fox and Min Woo Lee defeated Collin Morikawa and Wyndham Clark 1 up, Tom Kim and Si Woo Kim topped Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele 4 and 3, and Adam Scott – playing in his record 56th Presidents Cup match – and Christiaan Bezuidenhout (after rolling in a 31-footer on No. 16) defeated Justin Thomas and Cameron Young 3 and 2.
It was a dominating day for the International side as they, in the alternate-shot format, won twice as many holes as their American opponents — 24 versus 12.
“We just wanted to come win the session. They were all in a really good frame of mind, but you would never imagine (going 5-0),” said Ogilvy. “They all got off to a great start. We’ve seen in these events. When you get a lot of your team up on the leaderboards, some momentum, and it inspires all the groups.
“It was an incredible day for us.”
