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Scottie Scheffler wants to win them all

Published

4 weeks ago

August 22, 2024

Scottie Scheffler has enough of a lead in the FedExCup that he could have taken this week off and not played the BMW Championship. Skipping the BMW might have left him fresher for next week’s TOUR Championship in Atlanta.

The problem is, Scheffler said at Castle Pines on Wednesday, he not only wants to win the FedExCup, but he also wants to win the BMW. He wanted to win last week’s FedEx St. Jude Championship (solo fourth, three back). He wants to win them all.

“I just love coming out here and competing,” said Scheffler, who comes into this week with a 1,496-point lead over Xander Schauffele atop the FedExCup and would start next week’s TOUR Championship at Atlanta’s East Lake Golf Club with a two-shot lead if he remains the top seed.

The FedExCup Playoffs are never short on meaning, for just getting here brings enormous benefits. The top 50 who make it into the BMW also get guaranteed starts in all eight 2025 Signature Events, with their elevated points and money.

For many, the meaning of the Playoffs is the unpredictability – the surprise-and-delight factor that the playoffs bring to other sports and also golf.

“It’s no different than the New York Giants beating the New England Patriots and starting the playoffs 9-7, I think it was … and then winning the Super Bowl,” said Billy Horschel, who was an underdog when he won the 2014 FedExCup. (He’s 19th in the current standings after top-10 finishes in his last three starts, including a T2 at The Open Championship.)

“This is a Playoffs,” Horschel added. “Anything can happen.”

Points are quadrupled in the Playoffs, to 2,000 for the winner, and that can lead to big swings in the FedExCup standings. Viktor Hovland looked iffy for the top 50 into the BMW, which would mean not being able to defend his FedExCup title, but he tied for second at the FedEx St. Jude to move from 57th to 16th. Now he’s right back in the thick of things.

“OK, if I have a couple good weeks, we can still win this thing,” Hovland said of his thoughts last week. “That gives you a little bit more motivation than just kind of showing up and – if this was all over and there wasn’t that much I could do to improve my position, that would be a little different.