Schauffele is on the mend and motivated as ever

2025 MASTERS TOURNAMENT

Rib injuries kept him out of most of this season after impressive 2024

Xander Schauffele hits an approach shot to the second green during the second round of The Players Championship tournament on March 14 in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. JULIA DEMAREE NIKHINSON —ASSOCIATED PRESS

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By Doug Ferguson

Associated Press

AUGUSTA, Ga. >> Two majors made Xander Schauffele believe he was capable of winning them all. Two months out of golf with a rib injury is putting that belief to the test.

Schauffele is more than capable of winning the Masters. The proof comes from his birdie putt on the 18th hole to win the PGA Championship last May, followed by supreme control in tough conditions at Royal Troon to win the British Open last June. The guy who couldn’t win a major suddenly was halfway home to the career Grand Slam.

“I know what I’m capable of when I’m feeling good, when I’m not thinking of anything but getting the ball in the hole,” Schauffele said Monday at Augusta National. “It’s been a process to get back to that. ”

Even as the last player to win a major, the 31-year-old Californian is a little off the radar at the Masters. The focus is on Scottie Scheffler, the world’s No. 1 player and defending Masters champion, and Rory McIlroy, a winner already twice this year at The Players Championship and Pebble Beach to move past Schauffele to No. 2 in the world.

That’s due mainly to his time away. He discovered an intercostal strain in his rib, along with a slight tear in the cartilage, that left him out of competition from the season opener at Kapalua until he returned at Bay Hill.

In the three tournaments since then, his biggest feat was extending his streak to 60 consecutive cuts in a row, the longest on the PGA Tour since Tiger Woods some 20 years ago.

Schauffele had played well enough, and contended at the British Open in 2018, the Masters in 2019 and 2021, and the U.S. Open in 2024 when he opened with a record 63 at Los Angeles Country Club, that he started carrying the burden of being among the best without a major.

And then in span of just over two months, he was halfway to the career Grand Slam.

Where is he now? That’s not easy to answer.

Schauffele’s last start was at the Valspar Championship, where he was in the mix going into the weekend, fell back, finished strong and tied for 12th. It was progress, if nothing else, reaching a point where he felt a little freer with the swing and accepting of the outcome.