Cameron Young never looked like the was going to lose the Cadillac Championship on Sunday at Trump National Doral in Miami. Then again, he never looked like he would lose on Saturday. Or Friday. Or after his opening 64 on Thursday. The New York Knocker was in control all the way in a wire-to-wire victory that not only subdued an elite field but also bled red at the so-called Blue Monster.

Starting the day with a six-stroke lead over World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, Young put together a perfunctory but ultimately pleasing four-under 68 that enabled him to ease home by the same margin for his third career PGA Tour title and second win in his last four starts. He completed 72 holes in 19-under 269 with the second wire-to-wire victory on tour this year and third in the 50-plus years of tournament play at Doral, hosting its first tour event since 2016.

“I think when the golf course is difficult, when the conditions are difficult, that tend to make it easier for me mentally. Yeah, that’s a big part of keeping yourself in it out here,” said Young, who led the field with 24 birdies, something that’s not supposed to happen on the Blue Monster. “It’s difficult with the wind and the conditions were pretty benign today, but it is still a hard golf course and thankfully I was able to stay where my feet were and hit a bunch of good shots.”

Young, 28, joined Tiger Woods and Steve Elkington as the only men to win the Players at TPC Sawgrass and then tame the Blue Monster in the same year. He pocketed $3.6 million in winning his first signature event. Young entered the week ranked fourth in the world. He has to be considered a favorite in two weeks in the PGA Championship at Aronimink Golf Club near Philadelphia.

You know who appears to be a shoo-in for second place at Aronimink? Scheffler, who is the defending champion. And we are only sort of joking.

Left zero doubts

Cameron Young wins @Cadillac_Champ by SIX shots! pic.twitter.com/NVZIcDlanc

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 3, 2026

As has become his habit this year, the Texas native took Thursday off and it cost him. Scheffler leads the tour in scoring average at 68.22, which is amazing when you have to factor in his mundane Thursday’s in which he is ranked 72nd at 70.25. Not horrible, but he keeps spotting the field too many shots, which is how he has ended up in second place for the third straight start going back to the Masters. He has piled up 13 runner-up finishes next to his 20 victories. But having played three of four rounds with Young at Doral, Scheffler knew nothing but his best was going to stop a player who has figured out how to unlock the potential that always had been there when he was racking up seven runner-up finishes of his own before a breakthrough win in August at the Wyndham Championship.

“I’ve always been very impressed with Cam’s game,” said Scheffler, who also shot 68 for 13-under 275. “This week he hit a lot of quality shots. A lot of quality iron shots, quality tee shots, especially on the holes where it really matters. There are some tee shots out here that are really difficult and he stepped up and hit the shots. On the greens he was unbelievable this week. First 27 holes I don’t think he missed anything really. It was nuts. Guy was just holing everything. When you’re hitting really good shots and holing a lot of putts that’s a recipe to run away with a golf tournament.”

Which is exactly what unfolded.

With tee times moved up and the field playing preferred lies after more than an inch of rain had soaked the Monster, only Young was going to beat Young, and early on he gave it a shot when he called a penalty on himself on the second hole. Scheffler had birdied the par-5 first to gain a shot and then Young saw his ball roll forward slightly as he addressed it in the fairway at No. 2. Television replays could not pick up any movement, but Young called in a rules official and accepted a one-shot penalty dispassionately.

“Your heart sinks when you see it move, but it moved,” said Young, who equaled Hubert Green in 1976 for the largest margin of victory at Doral. “That’s part of what golf’s about. There’s no one who’s going to give me a penalty there but myself.”

Orlando Ramirez

What occurred next sent a signal that he wasn’t going to buckle. Not one bit. Young put his approach from 159 yards 13 feet short of the hole and then calmly rolled in the par save. He followed by making a 12-footers for birdies at Nos. 3 and 5, and even a couple of bogeys on the inward nine—Young had only five all week—only made it a bit less like the butt-whooping that it already was.

“Winning is really hard,” Young said, countering the previous assertion of how easy it appeared. “At no point did it feel easy, did it feel like the tournament was over. Even the last couple holes, there’s a lot that can happen and you’re never quite sure what the guys in front of you are going to do, the other guys in your group. So it was really just a matter of keeping my head down and trying to play good golf all the way through to the finish.”

As he approached the 18th green mid-afternoon Sunday, Young was greeted with a standing ovation that included President Donald Trump—a fellow New Yorker—who had arrived at the course around noon. Not a bad salute for your efforts. Later, he got to shake the president’s hand.

What’s different about Young these days? Well, his putting is vastly improved. He led the field in strokes gained—putting at plus 7.062 strokes. But there is also something deeper going on. His head has caught up to his hands.

Orlando Ramirez

“I think the self-belief just continues to build,” he said. “I put myself in plenty of good places over the course of the last four, five years of the recently I’ve started to come out on the better side of it.

“Once you’ve done it once, I think it is easier to do it again,” Young added. “But at the same time, the golf hasn’t changed tremendously. I think I keep just slowly improving in, I think, all the different areas of the game. I think I’m slightly better just everywhere than I was a year ago. That’s the goal, just keep incrementally getting a little bit better. When you do that, I think the good weeks come together and they look more like this as opposed to finishing second, third, fifth, where you had a chance to win and didn’t. So it’s just very, very small progress and it’s showing up in the results.”

Young is the season’s third multiple winner, joining Matt Fitzpatrick and Chris Gotterup, and it stands to reason that he might add to his trophy case again before the year is up. Including a T-3 at the Masters, where he led after 54 holes, Young has five top-10 finishes in nine starts, and coming up, he will get a crack at the next two majors in eastern U.S. venues, with the U.S. Open in his home state of New York at Shinnecock, in Long Island.

Guess what? Those are difficult golf courses.

That has to give Cameron Young a very warm feeling. And send chills to his opponents.

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Sound familiar?

No, we’re not talking about Scottie Scheffler in 2022. We are, of course, talking about Cameron Young in 2026.

Back in 2022, Young was named PGA Tour rookie of the year. That season, he finished runner-up not once, not twice, not three times … no, not even four. How about five times in 25 starts? As quickly as he became a name in the game, the former Wake Forest All-American’s name came with the (somewhat harsh) label of a bridesmaid.

Fast forward four years, and Young now has the biggest title of his career to date, his second PGA Tour win in his last 11 start,s while also boasting of being the stand-out player for the U.S. Ryder Cup team at Bethpage last September.

So what changed for Young? How did the 28-year-old evolve from the near-miss man to lifting the golden boy trophy at TPC Sawgrass? I’ve crawled through all the data and analysed Young’s game over his five years on tour, and to me, there are four elements to his evolution into an elite player.

1. His secret weapon

From the moment Young came on the PGA Tour, he was known as a bomber, capable of top-tier speed of the tee and able to launch drive after drive 300-plus yards on the fly. He seemed built for the modern style of play on tour, yet he had a glaring weakness: his putting.

Young ranked 158th out of 193 players on tour in strokes gained/putting in 2023. That year, he lost more than a shot per tournament, -0.287 shots per round, on the greens. In the biggest moments, in contention, he found it hard to convert chances and save crucial pars late over the weekend.

However, that changed in a big way in 2025, thanks to a new Scotty Cameron mallet and a slight tweak in his set-up, Young made a gigantic leap with his short game. In 12 months, he went from 145th on tour in SG/putting to seventh.

All this said, his new secret weapon wasn’t the putter. Rather, it was the person handing it to him.

Putts like the one Cameron Young made on the 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass in the final round of the Players Championship seem to have been falling more since good friend and former college teammate Kyle Sterbinsky started to caddie for him in 2025. David Cannon

Kyle Sterbinsky, a former teammate of Young’s at Wake Forest, began caddying for his friend at the RBC Canadian Open in June. Credited by his boss as being one of the best green readers he knows, Sterbinsky had a clear and almost immediate impact on Young’s putting.

“I knew he would be [a great fit] before he started caddieing. He’s a very good golfer in his own right,” Young said on Sunday in his post-victory press conference at TPC Sawgrass. “He’s one of my closest friends. He’s great at reading greens. He’s got a great mind for golf. So I knew he would be a good fit before I hired him.”

In the 10 months since he’s been on the bag, Young is the third best putter in the game according to DataGolf, now gaining 0.74 shots per round. Just a season earlier, he had been losing -0.23 shots per round on the greens.

That is a difference of almost a shot per round. And that has a lot to do with Young’s recent tour success. No better example than the 71st hole at the Players Championship, when Young rolled in a tricky, downhill 10-foot putt to tie the lead. It’s a putt that seemed like in the past would have burned the edge of the cup; this time it disappeared. One hole later, Young was lifting the trophy.

Conquering the 17th!

Cameron Young’s birdie ties him for the lead heading to the final hole.

NBC | @THEPLAYERS pic.twitter.com/iEXDPQ0mgk

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) March 15, 2026

2. His approach play

The term “streaky” is often used to describe certain golfers. Young’s approach play was indeed streaky for a long time. He seemed able to get on runs when he could knock down flags and capitalise on his power off the tee. Yet, sometimes in the same tournament—or even the same round—he would blow up. His approach play was letting him down.

In 2025, Young ranked 129th in strokes gained/approach, losing -0.124 shots per round, and 141st in proximity to the hole, hitting his approaches to just outside 38 feet, on average.

So far in 2026, it’s been a different story. Young ranks inside the top 25 in SG/approach, gaining nearly half a shot per round with his iron play, and is third in proximity to the hole.

Combine that with an improved ability to hole those putts and you can see how Young’s scores have improved.

3. His Driving

It might seem odd to suggest that Young’s game has gotten better through his driving; he has always been one of the longest and most powerful players on the PGA Tour. But it’s not distance he needed to improve.

In 2025, the data pointed to the fact that Young was one of the wildest players off the tee. Yes, he averaged more than 313 yards and nearly a third of his drives travelled longer than 320 yards, but his misses were bad. Scratch that, they were very bad.

Young’s driving accuracy was just 53.9 per cent, good enough to rank 167th out of 180 players on tour last season. And he didn’t just miss one way. He missed 16.6 per cent of tee shots left and 16.8 per cent of tee shots right. He had a control issue.

However, you guessed it, he seems to have combated the issue in 2026.

While his driving average has decreased by five yards, he has traded that for accuracy. He’s hitting 63 per cent of fairways, nearly 10 per cent more than he was just a season ago, and currently ranks inside the top five in SG/off the tee.

Once again, it showed at TPC Sawgrass. Standing on the 18th tee in the final round, tied for the lead, Young stared down the narrow strip of fairway and became calm. Despite it playing as the hardest hole for the week and the second hardest fairway to hit on Sunday, Young pulled driver and executed the perfect combination of length and accuracy, hitting his ball 375 yards and finding the fairway. It turned out to be the longest drive ever recorded on the 18th hole at TPC Sawgrass.

The longest drive on record on No. 18 @TPCSawgrass.

Cameron Young will have just 98 yards left into the 470-yard par 4. https://t.co/c90Lb22xun pic.twitter.com/28wHXE06Uf

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) March 15, 2026

Matt Fitzpatrick, tied with Young for the lead and statistically the most accurate driver in the field during the 2026 Players, was up next. But he would miss the fairway for the fourth straight day, eventually making a bogey. Young won the biggest title of his life, because and not in spite of his driver.

4. The Ryder Cup

Strokes gained measures a lot of areas of a player’s game, but it can’t measure confidence. Making his Ryder Cup debut last September at Bethpage, playing in his home state, Young was the best player on the American side. That’s not a take; there’s data to back it up.

Mike Stobe

Young went 3-1-0, playing in four of the five sessions. No American player won more points.

Young’s cumulative strokes gained total for the week was +5.06, a shot and a half better than any other American and second only to Tommy Fleetwood overall.

Young’s approach play gained 3.84 shots over his four matches. He was the best American in that category, too, and second only to Fleetwood for the week.

And in his last act, on the final hole at Bethpage Black, Young found the middle of the fairway, hit his approach shot to 12 feet and holed the birdie putt to beat Justin Rose and kick start a near-historic comeback from the Americans.

Driving, approach play and putting. It works at Ryder Cups and it works on the PGA Tour. And it’s why Cameron Young will no longer be known as the bridesmaid but rather the Players champion.

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Cameron Young is known for a few things. His swing, his power, his beard and, perhaps most tellingly, his poker face inside the ropes. But even the 28-year-old had to smile after arguably the best shot of his life on TPC Sawgrass’ 18th tee Sunday at the Players Championship.

After launching a 375-yard missile down the fairway, the co-leader said something to his caddie, Kyle Sterbinsky, and then smiled. Yes, Cameron Young.

And it’s easy to see why he would smile in that situation.

“My thought process over that ball is, one, making sure that I’m committed to my line, and two, the overarching thought is I’m going to hit the best shot of my life right here.”

In the biggest moment of his career, tied for the lead at the Players, on the 72nd hole, Young told himself not that he needed to hit the best shot of his life, that he was going to hit the best shot of his life. Afterwards, he acknowledged it’s not the usual thought that runs through his mind, but that it was prescient.

“I don’t know if I can think of one that’s better,” he told the media after the round.

James Gilbert

So how good was the drive?

Since 2004, when the PGA Tour started using ShotLink to track every shot in every event, there have been nearly 9,500 tee shots registered on the 18th tee at TPC Sawgrass. Young’s drive on Sunday was officially the longest ever recorded.

His ball carried 330 yards in the air and rolled out, coming to rest 375 yards on the right side of the fairway.

Now Young is known as one of the most powerful players on the PGA Tour, especially off the tee, but even for him, this was long.

The Players was Young’s sixth start of the season. The win was his third straight top-10 finish as he continues the form he finished the 2025 season in. His drive on the 72nd hole at Sawgrass was, however, the longest shot he’s registered on tour this season. He has hit 336 tee shots (i.e. non par 3s), and while hitting five tee shots more than 350 yards, his final tee shot was his longest drive of the season by eight yards.

But length is just one, admittedly flashy, aspect of the shot.

What made it in Young’s words, “the best shot” of his life was the situation and the result. Not only did he hit a 375-yard drive, he hit the fairway and did it while tied for the lead on the final hole of the biggest event of his career.

Matt Fitzpatrick, playing alongside Young and tied with him for the lead on the tee, hit his tee shot 352 yards but missed the fairway. His ball raced into the pine straw right of the fairway and forced him to lay up short of the green. Unable to get up and down, his bogey ultimately cost him the shot that could have gotten him into a playoff.

Ben Jared

By comparison, not only was Young’s tee shot long, it was also straight. Less than half the field (45.2 per cent) found the fairway on the 18th hole on Sunday. It was the second hardest fairway to hit on the course, behind only the fifth hole (41.1 per cent).

Young could have taken less than driver, prioritising hitting the fairway, and still had a pitching wedge or similar into the green. Instead, he chose to go all-in and go for the win. His tee shot was more than 88 yards longer than the average driving distance for the field on the 18th hole all week.

So Young not only gained distance on the field, but he also gained shots. Young’s tee shot gained +0.39 shots off the tee. By far, his best tee shot of the week at Sawgrass.

In fact, he has only hit two tee shots all season that have gained more than 0.39 shots. However, both had factors that slightly skewed their value.

First was his tee shot on the par-5 sixth hole at Bay Hill in the first round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational earlier this month. Hitting across the massive lake, Young carried his tee shot 325 yards, narrowly avoiding the water and finding the fairway. It gained 0.44 shots. However, it was early in the opening round of a tournament, not on the 72nd tee, tied for the lead.

The second tee shot came at last month’s WM Phoenix Open, when Young drove the green at the short par-4 17th hole. His tee shot finished 24 feet from the hole, 15 feet closer than any other shots hit off the tee during Saturday’s third round. His drive gained 0.79 shots. He two putted for birdie but was never in contention that week.

Statistically, Young’s tee shot at Sawgrass may only be valued as his third best tee shot of the season but it’s worth remembering that strokes gained doesn’t account for the situation. It’s fair to say that with every in play as he stood on the 18th tee on Sunday, his tee shot there possibly was “the best shot” of his life.

Ben Jared

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2: Matt Fitzpatrick, -12/276, $2.725 million

3: Xander Schauffele, -11/277, $1.725 million

4: Robert MacIntyre, -10/278, $1.225 million

T-5: Sudarshan Yellamaraju, -9/279, $925,000

T-5: Jacob Bridgeman, -9/279, $925,000

T-5: Ludvig Aberg, -9/279, $925,000

T-8: Tommy Fleetwood, -8/280, $731,250

T-8: Sepp Straka, -8/280, $731,250

T-8: Justin Thomas, -8/280, $731,250

T-11: Patrick Rodgers, -7/281, $606,250

T-11: Brian Harman, -7/281, $606,250

T-13: Sam Burns, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Akshay Bhatia, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Brooks Koepka, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Ryo Hisatsune, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Russell Henley, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Justin Rose, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Austin Smotherman, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Corey Conners, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-13: Viktor Hovland, -6/282, $409,027.78

T-22: Scottie Scheffler, -5/283, $271,250

T-22: Michael Thorbjornsen, -5/283, $271,250

T-24: Alex Smalley, -4/284, $221,250

T-24: J.J. Spaun, -4/284, $221,250

T-24: William Mouw, -4/284, $221,250

T-27: Hideki Matsuyama, -3/285, $178,750

T-27: Nicolai Hojgaard, -3/285, $178,750

T-27: Chris Kirk, -3/285, $178,750

T-27: Ryan Gerard, -3/285, $178,750

T-27: Chad Ramey, -3/285, $178,750

T-32: Jordan Spieth, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Eric Cole, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Bud Cauley, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Patrick Cantlay, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Andrew Putnam, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Alex Noren, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Max Homa, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Min Woo Lee, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Maverick McNealy, -2/286, $128,250

T-32: Sahith Theegala, -2/286, $128,250

T-42: Rickie Fowler, -1/287, $91,250

T-42: Wyndham Clark, -1/287, $91,250

T-42: Nick Taylor, -1/287, $91,250

T-42: Joe Highsmith, -1/287, $91,250

T-46: Rory McIlroy, E/288, $72,125

T-46: Taylor Pendrith, E/288, $72,125

T-46: Matti Schmid, E/288, $72,125

T-46: Keith Mitchell, E/288, $72,125

T-50: J.T. Poston, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-50: Taylor Moore, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-50: Zach Banchou, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-50: Max McGreevy, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-50: Si Woo Kim, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-50: Keegan Bradley, +1/289, $61,083.33

T-56: Adam Scott, +2/290, $58,000

T-56: Chris Gotterup, +2/290, $58,000

58: Sam Stevens, +3/291, $57,250

T-59: Kevin Roy, +4/292, $56,250

T-59: Lee Hodges, +4/292, $56,250

T-59: Jason Day, +4/292, $56,250

T-62: Danny Walker, +5/293, $54,500

T-62: Steven Fisk, +5/293, $54,500

T-62: Rico Hoey, +5/293, $54,500

T-62: Stephan Jaeger, +5/293, $54,500

T-66: Kristoffer Reitan, +6/294, $52,750

T-66: Daniel Berger, +6/294, $52,750

T-66: Nico Echavarria, +6/294, $52,750

69: Michael Brennan, +7/295, $51,750

T-70: Ricky Castillo, +8/296, $50,750

T-70: Tony Finau, +8/296, $50,750

T-70: Seamus Power, +8/296, $50,750

73: Takumi Kanaya, +10/298, $49,750

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Cameron Young powered his way to the biggest victory of his career on Sunday, outdueling playing partner Matt Fitzpatrick to win the Players Championship. Young sank a nine-foot birdie putt on the iconic par-3 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass to forge a tie with Fitzpatrick and then made par on the difficult 18th while Fitzpatrick bogeyed to earn a one-stroke victory.

A winner of his first PGA Tour title in his 94th start at the Wyndham Championship in August, Young, 28, needed only 10 more to capture the tour’s flagship event near tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.

Young closed with a four-under 68 to finish at 13-under 275. He pocketed $4.5 million.

“I feel like we just kept ourselves in a really good spot all day today, really all week,” Young said with a slight grin. “The nerves kicked in over the 8-inch putt on the last. That hole looked really, really small there from pretty close range. So happy to have finished it off, and just really excited to have played the way I did.”

Fitzpatrick, attempting to become the first player from England to win the Players, also had a 68 for solo second at 276. Winner of the 2022 U.S. Open, Fitzpatrick had either held or shared the lead since he birdied the 12th hole to catch 54-hole leader Ludvig Aberg. But he drove into the right trees at the par-4 18th hole and eventually failed to save par from eight feet.

Young, meanwhile, two-putted from 15 feet for par after unleashing a drive of 375 yards—reported to be the longest recorded drive on the 18th hole since the ShotLink era began in 2003. When he tapped in for the win, he shared a hug with Fitzpatrick. The two men are teammates on the New York Golf Club squad in TGL, the indoor simulator league.

Aberg, who began the day with a three-shot lead over fellow Ponte Vedra Beach resident Michael Thorbjornsen, became the eighth 54-hole leader in the last 11 years to fail to go on to win. The Swede led by two at the turn but put two balls in the water on consecutive holes at 11 and 12 and shot 40 on the inward nine for a closing 76. He ended up T-5 at nine-under 279.

Thorbjornsen’s hopes were dashed early with a quadruple bogey at the par-four fourth hole. He shot 77-283 to drift back into a tie for 22nd place.

Xander Schauffele birdied three of the last four holes to shoot 69 and finish solo third at 11-under 277. Left-hander Robert MacIntyre, who after 11 holes was tied with Fitzpatrick just two behind Aberg, also had 69 to finish another stroke back.

This was Young’s fifth start at the Players, after previously finishing no better than T-51 in 2023.

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When Young pulled his drive into the left rough, came up short on his approach, hit an awful third, and missed his 21-foot par putt, perhaps you could briefly sense the ghosts of his seven previous runner-up finishes. Perhaps you could start to envision a nightmare playing out at Sedgefield Country Club. Perhaps you could talk yourself into something other than the runaway that his five-shot 54-hole lead promised.

And then he made five straight birdies. And then it was over.

Young’s scintillating front-nine stretch, which included putts of eight feet, 26 feet, eight feet, seven feet and 13 feet, seemed at that moment like a re-telling of the tortoise and the hare fable, where the determined hare just keeps running and leaves exactly 74 other turtles in his dust. Young, 28, is somewhat famous in golf for his resume of second-place finishes—seven, in all—but this was his first 54-hole lead, and he capitalised on it with a series of exclamation marks. Sometimes, when you’re meant to win, you’re really meant to win.

Those were the last birdies Young would make on the day, and they were the last he needed, eventually finishing at 22 under par, eight shots clear of Mac Meissner in second. The only topic of mild interest in the home stretch were a pair of tournament records—Jesper Parnevik’s 23 under par in 1999, the best score to par, and the aggregate record of 258 achieved by both Henrik Stenson (2017) and J.T. Poston (2019). Two late bogeys cost Young the Parnevik record and left him with the exact same aggregate as Stenson and Poston, who he’ll join in the record books.

"I've been waiting for it for a while. I never thought I'd really be that emotional about it."

Cameron Young joins Amanda Balionis after the win pic.twitter.com/8gzA9H2qPq

— Golf on CBS (@GolfonCBS) August 3, 2025

The extent to which any of that mattered to him could best be intuited by the fact that he called the back nine “the least stressful few holes of my career.” All he cared about, understandably, was bagging that elusive win.

“It feels like a long time coming,” he said. “I felt like for the first year and a half that I was out here I had a chance to win every third week it felt like. They’ve been a bit more few and far between, so to have a chance like this today, I was not going to let it get away from me and I’m thankful that I didn’t.”

Young had a pair of very good results earlier in the summer with back-to-back T-4 finishes at the Canadian and U.S. Opens, but it would have been impossible to see this kind of dominance coming, particularly after a missed cut in his last start.

So how do you explain it?

One answer might be Young’s commitment to return to hitting a draw, which had been his usual method of attack earlier in his career. The concept occurred to him around 10 days ago, and he decided to put it in play this week, even when a shot seemed to call for a different shape. Pin tucked on the right of the green? He was still hitting a draw. Clearly, it worked.

“I was really just kind of curious how that would affect playing out there,” he said. “You know, there’s times that it wasn’t my first choice of shot, but I kind of just committed to doing it all week. I’m sure there’s a couple you could go back to some right pins where conventional wisdom says don’t start it right of the right fringe, but I told myself I was going to do it and stuck to it all week.”

Johnnie Izquierdo

There’s also the putting. Young has gone from 145th in strokes gained/putting last year to 10th this year, which he attributes to a few tweaks in his setup and a lot of practice. This week, he was first among all players in putting, gaining 10.8 strokes, which he cemented with his hot streak on the front nine.

As always, this win belonged in part to his family. Young’s father, David Young, was the head pro at Sleepy Hollow Country Club in New York, and he was with Young every step of the way on Sunday. Back at the club, a party was underway, and with discount drinks offered for each birdie, Young gave them plenty of chances to accelerate the festivities. Young spoke of the role his father played—he’s like a manager and a coach all in one—but he also spoke of another New York connection that will be pertinent this fall: The Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black.

“It hurt pretty bad to miss it a couple years ago,” he said on Saturday. “I was ninth on the points list and didn’t get picked, so I was a bit frustrated with that. Set out the year to give our captain no choice, and I don’t know if I’m in a position to do that or not, but it would take some really good golf between now and then. But if I’m in the question, that’s been a big goal of mine, and I’d love to put myself there anyway.”

RELATED: Here’s the prize money payout for each player at the Wyndham Championship

He’s taken the first big step, and while he won’t be anywhere near automatic qualification (he’ll rise to 15th place), and may still be on the outside looking in, he’s undoubtedly put himself in position to make the team with strong finishes in the playoffs.

And speaking of playoffs, this finish will also remove one source of stress—he came into the week 40th in the standings, with his position even in the second event uncertain. Now, he’s 16th, and has an inside track to make the Tour Championship.

In many ways, it was possible to forget about Young after his hot streak came to an end in 2024 without a win to show for it, and in the shadow of Scottie Scheffler’s emergence, there’s less oxygen for someone who isn’t winning at his outrageous clip. But this win changes everything, and makes him impossible to forget—on tour, in the playoffs to come, and, he hopes, for captain Keegan Bradley. In all these ways, he seems to be gaining ground a bit later than expected, but there’s no doubt that he’s gaining fast.

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Main Image: Jared C. Tilton

The post Finally, the drought is over! Cameron Young coasts to maiden PGA Tour victory appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Young hasn’t just remained out of the winner’s circle in 2025, but he’s uncharacteristically struggled of late with consecutive missed cuts. And it took only one swing at this week’s Arnold Palmer Invitational to add to his struggles.

Cameron Young: *steps onto the golf course*

All of gambling twitter: pic.twitter.com/9wEqY3qFzx

— Christopher Powers (@CPowers14) February 14, 2025

But there was something else that stood out about Young piping his opening tee shot at Bay Hill OB. Look closely and you’ll see he had an AirPod in:

Cameron Young just hit his opening tee shot out of bounds with an AirPod in pic.twitter.com/jPB7rIsf4L

— Joseph LaMagna (@JosephLaMagna) March 6, 2025

Apparently, you can take the player out of TGL, but you can’t take TGL out of the player.

Of course, it’s not uncommon for PGA Tour pros to practice or warm up listening to music (and in recent years, players have put one in their ear to do walk-and-talk interviews).

But regardless, it was an unusual scene. And, not surprisingly, the aforementioned Golf/Gambling Twitter had a field day with it:

pod or ball? probably both

— Joseph LaMagna (@JosephLaMagna) March 6, 2025

He should just focus on TGL where can let his personality shine.. he’s built for it, total electric factory

— ajh8912 (@djh32781) March 6, 2025

Finishing up a long running zoom call on mute… he’s one of us!

— Eric Loh (@lohshow) March 6, 2025

Wrong answers only…. what was he listening too… I’ll go first…

Hook, By Blues Traveler.

— GolfCommunityNotes (@GolfCmuntyNotes) March 6, 2025

Oh, man. Great song. I wouldn’t be able to hit stop in the middle of that one either. Anyway, as someone pointed out, Young took the AirPod out by the time he reached the green:

Looks like the pod is out for his triple bogey putt pic.twitter.com/8OJgz28r0X

— Zag (@leftyzag) March 6, 2025

Ouch.

Main Image: Getty Images

The post Cameron Young pipes opening tee shot OB with AirPod in, Golf Twitter has a field day appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

You’ve also got to avoid your equipment cracking under pressure, and on Sunday at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, Cam Young failed at least the second part of that equation.

Following an errant drive on the 14th hole, trailing the leader Akshay Bhatia by one at the time, Young pulled a strange manoeuvre where he placed the head of his driver on the ground, leaned forward in a way that made it bend, and managed to crack the shaft. Watch:

Cameron Young's driver is officially out of play for the day. pic.twitter.com/97SNDqU4IR

— Golf on CBS (@GolfonCBS) June 30, 2024

It’s unclear what he was doing—Trevor Immelman picked up on the driver being cracked right away, and the crack was audible on the broadcast, but the “why” of it is still a mystery. Was he frustrated or angry?

Most clubs broken in anger involve a much more demonstrative spectacle than what we saw from Young. But if it wasn’t his irritation coming out, it’s hard to understand what he was doing, or what he thought might happen when he bent the club.

Young is one of the best players on the PGA Tour without a victory, and the cracked driver came amid his latest chance to erase that distinction.

Young was 17 under and one back on 14, and despite the drive, he still made par on the hole (though he made an eagle and two birdies in his previous rounds, so par is arguably a step back).

With his driver unavailable, he made bogey on 16, but then hit two straight 3-woods to the green on the par-5 17th and settled for par.

Trailing by two shots, though, with five players ahead of him, it’s likely a case of too little, too late.

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But he found water off the tee on the par three seventh resulting in a double bogey, and the bad scoring wasn’t done. A further dropped shot in the eighth hole put him back to 11 under. And the tournament invitee had one eye on what McIlroy was doing….

“I saw it” said Young. “I think I was talking to my dad before we went out and played that I put the over/under about 64 1/2. I guess it was on the underside of that.

“But yeah, someone like him (McIlroy), I feel like you expect him to do that. Figured he wasn’t going to be 30th for long.”

Young fought back well, three birdies coming back home put him back on top of the leadboard after a whirlwind day for the man who is yet to win on a Major tour. If he was to break that duck on Sunday, he would also become just the fifth American to win this event in its 35-year history.

“Obviously it’s been a while since those Korn Ferry Tour wins. It would be a nice feeling.

“It’s one of those times that you feel like kind of at peace with what you’ve done, and it’s something I would love to do tomorrow. But I’ve put myself in another great place to have a chance, and I’m happy with that.

“So if I go out and go through the process that we’ve kind of set up for tomorrow and see what happens, see what happens.”

Rory McIlroy had the round of the day after his sublime 63, which equals his lowest score around the Majlis, and is just two shots back from Young. There is more about that magical round from Rory on page four. The Northern Irishman is set to tee it up alongside Young in the final pairing.

Dubai based Adrian Meronk is also on the same number, as the three-time winner, at 12 under. Joining the World Number Two in a tie for second after his third round of two under 70.

Haotong Li and Rasmus Højgaard sit in 4th spot at nine under par, realistically a touch too far back to contend for the coveted Dallah trophy.

You can find the full draw sheet for the fourth and final round on page 10. Have a great day!

Image: Getty Images

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The 26-year-old, who is making his debut in the tournament, followed up his bogey-free 67 on day one with an ‘almost bogey-free’ 64 on Friday, had it not been for a dropped shot on his final hole after his approach shot found the water.

Young, who has two Korn Ferry Tour victories to his name and four top 10s in the majors throughout the past two years, puts his scoring around the Majlis mainly down to his trusty flat stick.

“I putted fantastic,” he said. “I made a couple of long ones yesterday and then made a few more today that had no right going in.

“I hit a bunch of good putts but just one of those days where you kind of have a couple of 30-footers and you look up and they are going right in the middle, which doesn’t happen all that often to have a bunch of them in one round.”

The American seems to be settling into Emirates Golf Club very well by just doing his own thing, as the New Yorker enjoyed the favourable conditions he had on Friday morning in Dubai.

“I’m doing a really good job of staying out of my own way. I kind of realised it was going well early but the back nine, at the same time, it feels like you should do that to some extent, especially in the morning with not much wind.

“I feel like the back nine, I just played really solidly, and then made a putt on one, made a putt on four and all of a sudden that was eight (under) or something.

“Just one of those days that they kept kind of going in and I didn’t make too many mistakes.”

Young is three shots clear from Dubai resident Adrian Meronk, after the Pole had a bogey-free 66, which sees him sit alongside Andy Sullivan in a tie for second after the Englishman matched his Thursday 67 with the same on Friday.

Round of the day went to Japan’s Masahiro Kawamura who shot a nine under 63, highlighted with an eagle two on the par four 14th after he holed his approach shot from 169 yards.

Defending champion, Rory McIlroy, could only manage a two under 70 on Friday, still, it sees him through to the weekend on three under.

Image: Getty Images

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