April 22, 2026

Welcome to the twenty-third edition of The Tee Sheet - your weekly read on what matters in the world of golf right now.

Matt Fitzpatrick led from the front at Hilton Head, nearly let it slip, then hit one of the best long irons you'll see all year to beat the world's best player in a playoff.

Meanwhile, Jon Rahm was dominant in Mexico City — the problem was nobody was talking about Rahm. They were talking about whether the league he plays for will exist next year.

Brilliant individual performance on the PGA Tour, genuine existential moment for golf's biggest rivalry. We cover both — plus a full Zurich Classic preview, where the Fitzpatrick brothers arrive in New Orleans as the hottest team in the field.

Let's get into it.

Note: Rising / Falling includes biggest movers in the OWGR Top 150

Tourney Recap

Ludvig Åberg set the early tone with a stress-free, bogey-free 63 on Thursday — eight birdies, no drama — to take the first-round lead at Harbour Town. But the man who took control of the week was Matt Fitzpatrick, who had played the course his whole life in his mind. Coming off a win at the Valspar Championship, Fitzpatrick carded a bogey-free 63 of his own on Friday to seize a four-shot lead at -14, with Viktor Hovland his closest pursuer and Scottie Scheffler — coming off a runner-up at the Masters — lurking seven back.

Saturday threw him back into traffic. Fitzpatrick made three bogeys in his first seven holes and suddenly the field was alive — Si Woo Kim, Brian Harman, and Scheffler all briefly tied for the lead. But Fitzpatrick steadied: he drove the green on the short par-4 ninth, chipped in for eagle on 15, and closed with a 68 to lead Scheffler a few heading into Sunday.

The final round looked comfortable — until it wasn't. Fitzpatrick birdied two of his first three holes to push the margin to four, then put in par after par on the back nine, seemingly home. But Scheffler — the relentless world No. 1 — closed with back-to-back birdies on 15 and 16, and Fitzpatrick's chip from the rough on 18 came up short, leaving a 20-footer for par he couldn't convert. Both finished at 18-under 266, forcing a playoff — the fourth in five years at Harbour Town.

Back on 18, Fitzpatrick hit 4-iron into a stiff breeze to 13 feet. Scheffler fanned a 6-iron 37 yards short of the hole. Fitzpatrick rolled in the birdie. Tournament over.

Si Woo Kim finished alone in third at -16, while Collin Morikawa, Harris English, and Ludvig Åberg tied for fourth at -13.

The win — Fitzpatrick's fourth on the PGA Tour and second at Harbour Town — earned him $3.6 million and moved him to second in the FedExCup standings. It also makes him just the fourth Englishman in history to win multiple PGA Tour titles in a single season, alongside Nick Faldo, Justin Rose, and Luke Donald, and lifts him to a career-high No. 3 in the world ranking. He and Scheffler are both weeks removed from the Masters, where Rory McIlroy won — meaning the PGA Championship pecking order just got a lot more interesting with Fitzpatrick arriving in full form after his second win of the season.

The kid who used to vacation at Hilton Head now owns it twice.

The PGA Tour's calendar needs a breath between the Masters and the PGA Championship run, and the Zurich Classic of New Orleans provides exactly that. The winning duo each receives $1.37 million and 400 FedExCup points.

The format is genuinely different from anything else on Tour. The event uses an alternating-round fourball and foursomes structure — rounds one and three are fourball (best ball), and rounds two and four are foursomes (alternate shot). 80 teams start the week, with the top 33 and ties advancing through a halfway cut after round two. The foursomes days are where tournaments are won and lost — chemistry, shared equipment philosophy, and the ability to bail each other out become as important as ball-striking.

Last year, Ben Griffin and Andrew Novak outlasted twins Nicolai and Rasmus Højgaard for a one-stroke victory at 28-under, with Griffin's birdie on the penultimate hole serving as the decisive blow. Both men are back to defend — no team has won back-to-back since the team format launched in 2017.

The storyline that swallows the week is the Fitzpatrick brothers. Matt Fitzpatrick arrives off his RBC Heritage win — his second PGA Tour victory in three starts — having climbed to No. 3 in the world, while younger brother Alex won his first DP World Tour title at the Hero Indian Open in March. No other pair arrives with both players victorious in their previous event. Matt's recent form at Pete Dye tracks (this week at TPC Louisiana) — a runner-up at TPC Sawgrass followed by a win at Harbour Town — makes him dangerous yet again.

The other pairing worth watching is Brooks Koepka and Shane Lowry, back together at TPC Louisiana for the first time — Koepka returning to the Zurich for the first time since 2019, pairing with Lowry, who won this event in 2024 with Rory McIlroy (not in the field this week).

A switch up to team golf for a week is the refresher we all need as the PGA Championship creeps closer.

🏆Rahm Wins in Mexico City as LIV’s Future Hangs in the Air

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That's a wrap on another big week in golf — and honestly, one of the more eventful ones in a while. A playoff thriller at Harbour Town, a dominant LIV win played out against a backdrop of genuine uncertainty, and a team event in New Orleans that has more storyline than it gets credit for.

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See you next week.