While Scottie Scheffler was continuing his dominance at the star-studded RBC Heritage last weekend, another official PGA Tour event was going down in the Dominican Republic: the 2024 Corales Puntacana Championship.
At the opposite-field Tour event, 37-year-old former FedEx Cup champion Billy Horschel ended a lengthy win drought by capturing his eighth PGA Tour victory.
While Horschel’s winnings ($720,000, modest by Tour standards) paled in comparison to Scheffler’s ($3.6 million), Horschel’s victory may have been more meaningful for several reasons.
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It moved him up to 40th in the FedEx Cup standings, for one. It likely will earn him a spot in the next Signature Event, the Wells Fargo Championship, too. Horschel will also rise further in the Official World Golf Ranking, increasing his chances of earning a spot in the final three majors of 2024.
Following his final-round 63 that gave him a two-shot win, Horschel expressed his relief over what the accomplishment means for his career.
“Hopefully I do get into Wells Fargo, which will be a great event. Hopefully my world ranking gets close to qualifying for the U.S. Open and the British Open, two events I’m still not qualified for,” Horschel said Sunday night, continuing, “But like I said, listen, it’s still a process. I’m not anywhere close to where I want to be or back to where I want to be, but this win is just a satisfaction, just a — you know, I’m drawing a blank on the word I’m looking for. For all the hard work we’ve all put in, it’s just nice to see the results finally come to fruition.”
But the victory didn’t just provide Horschel with some workplace relief, he also revealed that it will provide him some relief on the homefront, specifically when it comes to his own kids’ “honest to a fault” questions about his performances during a difficult year on Tour.
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“The kids and the wife were unbelievable. I knew they were watching on TV, I knew they would be over the moon. The last year’s been unbelievable. Early in their life they never had to worry about daddy, you know, making a cut,” Horschel shared. “I made — like cut percentage was very, very high on a yearly basis.”
He continued, “To see them last year to go from, ‘Daddy, did you win, are you going to win,’ to ‘Daddy, did you make the cut?’ That’s what they ask me all the time now, ‘did you make the cut’ or ‘are you making the cut?’ It’s sort of a cold hard slap in the face.”
“As we all know, kids are honest to a fault, they don’t have no filter yet. So it just keeps you humbled,” Horschel concluded. “And yeah, I’ve got a great support system at home and they’re over the moon and excited for me.”
But Horschel doesn’t get to go home to celebrate with his kids in person just yet. For now, he’s heading straight to New Orleans for the 2024 Zurich Classic team event, where he’ll join forces with Tyson Alexander and attempt to claim a winner’s check even larger than last week’s in the D.R.: $1,286,050 to each winning team member.
