New World No. 3 Rory McIlroy needs to remain straight-faced in handling little-known American opponent Smylie Kaufman.
The match-up in this week’s WGC – Dell Match-Play Championship is one of the strangest of the 64 players who have travelled to the Texas capital of Austin, located just under a 3-hour drive from Houston.
With thanks to Wikipedia Kaufman was born on November 30, 1991 in Birmingham, Alabama.
His first name is actually Carter and the name ‘Smylie’ is a tribute to his grandmother’s cousin, Smylie Gebhart, who was an All-American defensive end for Georgia Tech in 1971. He played college golf at Louisiana State University (LSU). He turned professional after graduating in 2014; in December 2014 he tied for 67th place at the Web.com Tour Qualifying School final stage.
Carter ‘Smyle’ Kaufman all smiles in winning a first PGA Tour title late last year.
Kaufman played on the Web.com Tour in 2015. After missing the cut in his first three tournaments, he finished T-4 in the next two and won the third, the United Leasing Championship to claim his first professional title. He finished the year sixth on the money list to earn his card for the 2016 PGA Tour season.
On October 25, 2015, Kaufman earned his first victory on the PGA Tour by winning the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open by a single stroke over six players. In the final round, he came from seven strokes back after a round of 61, that included eight birdies and an eagle, to claim his maiden victory.
This earned Smylie a place into next month’s Masters, the 2016 PGA Championship and this week’s WGC.
And at tonight’s draw McIlroy was asked his thoughts of playing a competitor he’s never met before.
“You don’t know what to expect but that’s why you can sort of get a sense of what his game is like over the first couple of holes,” said McIlroy.
“There’s guys that you play in match play that will hit it all over, they’ll miss fairways, they’ll miss greens, but they’ll get it up and down and it will be very frustrating. But other guys will hit fairways and hit greens and maybe hole a few, but miss quite a lot. So you’ll get a feel of what type of player they are. That’s what I’ll have to do with that.
“I really don’t know anything about Smylie’s game or what his strengths are or weaknesses are. But the other two guys, I know what they do well and what they don’t do so well. Out of the three, that’s the one that I’m going to have to sort of just figure out as the round progresses.”
And after a roller-coaster showing in Orlando last week McIlroy will be striving to get back to some ‘normality’ in this week’s title defence and his last before heading to Augusta and the April 7th starting Masters.
“It’s always good to come back to a tournament where you’ve won and had success before,” he said tonight in down town Austin.
“This tournament has went through a few different venues with San Francisco last year. It doesn’t change the fact that it is match play, and you have to beat the person that’s there in front of you. I feel like that’s been the best approach for me in match play is the golf course is almost irrelevant, in a way.
“But then it’s about playing the player that’s in front of you there on the first tee.It’s a sprint. It’s 18 holes. You don’t really have time to find your rhythm. You need to try to make birdies from the get-go. And that’s the approach I’ve adopted the last few years. And I feel like my match play record for the most part speaks for itself. I’ve had a pretty good record since I’ve turned pro in this tournament and in the Ryder Cup, as well.
“So I’m looking forward to the week. Looking forward to seeing the golf course tomorrow. Excited to get going.”
After the preliminary stroke play rounds McIlroy faces not only Kaufman but also Kevin Na and Thorbjorn Olesen in his group.
“Kevin I’ve played before in this event, back in Arizona, maybe 2010, I think. And, yeah, he’s playing very well,” said McIlroy.
“He’s had a great year. I was actually just looking through the stats on the PGA Tour, sort of just looking for my stats a little bit. But then there was a couple of areas that I’m focusing on, and Kevin is right at the top of those. So it was quite interesting that I drew his name today.
“Thorbjorn is a good friend of mine. I’ve known him for a long time playing the European Tour. Actually, the first time I played with Thorbjorn was in Egypt in 2010. We’ve got a little bit of history.
“And as I said earlier, Smylie, I really don’t know that much about. I know that he got off to a great start in his PGA Tour career. As I said, no matter who you draw in this event you know you’re going to get a tough match. I need to be on my game from the start and try to win those three matches and progress to the weekend.”
