After a few big tournaments in a row, the PGA Tour fires up a team event, the only team event on the official schedule. It’s a nice change of pace to recharge the batteries before a final push toward the final three majors and FedExCup Playoffs.
The Zurich Classic of New Orleans switched to the team format in 2017 and has run five times under that format. Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele are headlining the field and also playing the role of defending champs.
As you can imagine with a unique event, the field size and cutline rules are also different. There are 80 teams of two which make it the largest field size (160) that we see all season. The teams will alternate fourballs and foursomes before a 36-hole cut of the low 33 teams and ties.
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TEAMS TO WATCH
Xander Schauffele & Patrick Cantlay
They are the pre-tournament betting favorites and the defending champs. They both just twirled top-15s at the Masters and top-5s at Harbour Town. Will they have enough gas in the tank after two big events?
Collin Morikawa & Max Homa
They may have been the betting favorites if this event was hosted in California. Their games do travel well, though. Homa has been racking up wins left and right over the last few seasons but Morikawa is “slumping” without a win since the DP World Tour Championship at the end of 2021.
Sam Burns & Billy Horschel
Speaking of location, these two are big fans of the area. Burns has Louisiana roots and is an LSU product while Horschel has said this feels like a “second home” to him. This duo landed a runner-up finish last year but Horschel is not peaking right now, to put things politely. He’s finished T-30 or worse in all nine stroke-play events this year. Will some course comforts help him snap out of that funk?
Sungjae Im & Keith Mitchell
Mitchell got rejected when asking Im to partner up at this event a few years ago. Well, Im had already committed to play with someone else that year. The young South Korean was not only available this time around but asked Mitchell to team up, and they should certainly be a strong contender this week. They both rank 27th or better in par breakers this season.
Sahith Theegala & Justin Suh
Theegala has done a lot of heavy lifting over the weekends lately while Suh just keeps clipping away at 13 consecutive cuts made. Suh’s consistency with Theegala’s low-round potential could make this a very interesting team to watch this week in NOLA.
RANKING THE FIELD
1. Xander Schauffele & Patrick Cantlay
2. Collin Morikawa & Max Homa
3. Sungjae Im & Keith Mitchell
4. Si Woo Kim & Tom Kim
5. Kurt Kitayama & Taylor Montgomery
6. Sahith Theegala & Justin Suh
7. Sam Burns & Billy Horschel
8. Wyndham Clark & Beau Hossler
9. Nick Taylor & Adam Hadwin
10. Matt Fitzpatrick & Alex Fitzpatrick
11. Victor Perez & Thomas Detry
12. Joel Dahmen & Denny McCarthy
13. Thorbjorn Olesen & Nicolai Hojgaard
14. J.J. Spaun & Hayden Buckley
15. Harris English & Tom Hoge
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