Brandt Snedeker has performed among the best golf of his profession, however there’s one Sunday that also occupies extra of his reminiscence than a decade of trophies ever might. Fourteen years after Europe’s beautiful Ryder Cup comeback swallowed a four-point American lead at Medinah, Snedeker is heading again to that very same Chicago-area membership, this time as the person accountable for the U.S. Presidents Cup group, hoping to settle a rating that has by no means fairly left him.
“It was a troublesome Sunday for us, and it nonetheless stings,” Snedeker instructed Medinah members.
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That admission units the tone for the 2026 Presidents Cup, which begins subsequent week at Medinah Nation Membership, the place Snedeker’s United States squad will face an Worldwide group captained by Geoff Ogilvy. For each males the venue carries a really private weight, although for reverse causes. Snedeker went 1-2 in his lone Ryder Cup look in 2012, capped by a lopsided singles loss as Europe rallied from 4 factors down to grab the Cup away in what’s remembered because the “Miracle at Medinah.” Ogilvy, against this, arrives as one thing near an area hero: he co-led the $23.5 million redesign of Medinah’s No. 3 Course, unveiled in 2024, and has since been handed a courtesy membership membership.
That cut up historical past hangs over all the things the 2 captains do that week. The People have not misplaced this occasion since 1998. However he is made clear this one means extra. Standing in entrance of Medinah’s members, he instructed them straight that his 2012 group had allow them to down, and that this journey is his shot at lastly making it proper, in response to Golf Digest.
Ogilvy’s scenario is trickier than simply being a pleasant face on the membership. He helped redesign the very course his personal group must beat the People on, and other people maintain asking him the apparent query: does figuring out the place all the difficulty is hidden, the false fronts, the tough pin spots, give his aspect an edge? He does not suppose so.
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As soon as actual professionals tee it up, he says, any design information disappears quick. There’s precedent for that skepticism. Jack Nicklaus constructed Muirfield Village hoping it might assist the People win the 1987 Ryder Cup, and Europe gained there anyway. Expertise beat the blueprint.
Complicating the storyline additional is the truth that Medinah’s present No. 3 Course bears nearly no resemblance to the 2012 structure. It is a completely different golf course in practically each significant respect, which theoretically strips away no matter tactical reminiscence both group may carry from that Ryder Cup Sunday. But the psychological residue stays, evident even in how different gamers talk about the membership. Tiger Woods, who gained two PGA Championships there and holds Medinah’s solely honorary membership, has nonetheless known as the 2012 outcome “a disgrace” when the membership comes up in dialog.
The reality is, Sunday in all probability will not come right down to both man’s historical past with the grounds. Ogilvy mentioned as a lot himself, that no matter course information he has will get worn out inside a couple of holes as soon as twenty-four of one of the best gamers on the planet are literally competing. What’s actually been deciding this occasion for 3 a long time is the scoreboard: the U.S. has gained 13 of the 15 Presidents Cups performed by means of 2024, with one tie in 2003 and a single Worldwide victory in 1998. That hole, not some redesigned bunker, is why the Internationals maintain shedding.
Nonetheless, the emotional stakes for Snedeker are actual, they usually’ll be seen all week. A win at Medinah would not simply prolong a dominant American run, it might shut a loop the Ryder Cup left open in 2012. For Ogilvy, a win would do one thing no renovation might: show that Worldwide golf can lastly clear up a puzzle that has eluded it for practically three a long time, on a course he constructed along with his personal palms. Whichever method it breaks, Medinah is about so as to add a second chapter to a popularity it by no means requested for.
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