MONTREAL — When the fog finally lifted Saturday morning at Royal Montreal Golf Club, so did the metaphorical lid on the hole for the U.S. side.
U.S. Captain Jim Furyk sent out two of his top horses in the first match and Scottie Scheffler and Collin Morikawa delivered a full point, winning 2 and 1 over Adam Scott and Taylor Pendrith.
“I think captain instilled some confidence in me and Collin to go out and get a point and it wasn’t pretty today but we did what we needed to do to get the point, and that’s what’s most important,” Scheffler said.
The U.S. won three of the four four-ball matches to grab an 8-6 lead. The U.S. needs seven more points to retain the Cup.
Scheffler took a little longer to heat up on a cool morning during which play was suspended for an hour and 37 minutes due to fog. The world No. 1 failed to make a single birdie in the first 15 holes. But he stuck his approach at 16 inside 10 feet and drained the putt to put the U.S. 1 up, and canned a putt from the front fringe to seal the 2-and-1 victory.
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“I was getting a little bit impatient out there and I’m standing there on 15 green thinking to myself, ‘What am I doing?’” Scheffler said. “I was able to make a couple birdies when my partner needed me because he was a bit alone out there for a while today, so I was proud to step up when I needed to.”
In the second match, Americans Tony Finau and Xander Schauffele downed the Canadian team of Corey Conners and Mackenzie Hughes, 3 and 2. The U.S. made birdie at No. 9 to take a 2-up lead at the turn. The Canadians cut the deficit in half with a birdie at 11, but Conners missed a short putt at 12 to lose the hole and the momentum. Schauffele, the winner of two majors this year, said his team was hungry to get rid of the taste of being swept on Friday.
“You’ve heard me before at individual events talking about you’ve got to have some dog in you. When I look around my team room, I see a lot of dogs. We’ve proved that so far,” he said.
The one bright spot for the Internationals in the morning was the South Korean duo of Si Woo Kim and Tom Kim, who pounded Keegan Bradley…
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