Brooks Koepka closes gap in Olympic Golf Ranking at PGA Championship
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by Preston Smith
After battling a knee injury for several months, Brooks Koepka contended at the 2021 PGA Championship before eventually settling for a runner-up finish as Phil Mickelson surged for a historic victory.
With the T2 finish, Koepka has now finished top-five in eight of his last 14 starts in majors, which includes four wins and three runner-up finishes.
“The thing was, Phil played great,” reflected Koepka after the tournament. “That whole stretch when we turned after 4 and 5 and played those holes, it's into off the left for me and that's quite difficult for a right-handed player. And it suited Phil right down to the ground, and I thought he played that entire stretch from about 6 to 13 so well. So you know, I'm happy for him, Amy and Tim. It's pretty cool to see, and you know, but a bit disappointed in myself.”
While Koepka is still on the outside looking in as the fifth-ranked American in the Olympic Golf Ranking, he did leapfrog other contenders Patrick Reed and Webb Simpson to sit just behind Justin Thomas, Xander Schauffele, Bryson DeChambeau and Collin Morikawa with three events to go before the men’s Olympic Golf Ranking is finalized on June 21.
The three-event stretch will consist of this week’s the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide and next week’s Palmetto Championship at Congaree before concluding with the year’s third major, the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines.
The top-15 world-ranked players will be eligible for the Olympics in Tokyo this summer, with a limit of four players from a given country. Beyond the top 15, players will be eligible based on the world rankings, with a maximum of two eligible players from each country that does not already have two or more players among the top-15.
