Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler went into the Memorial Tournament as a final tune-up for the U.S. Open and came out with the same problem they brought in: not enough certainty in their games. McIlroy finished tied for 12th, Scheffler left without the sharpest version of himself, and both head for Shinnecock Hills next week still looking for answers.
That matters because the U.S. Open is being played at Shinnecock Hills on Long Island, a course with a record of exposing the smallest flaws. Brooks Koepka won there in 2018 at one over par, while Retief Goosen’s 2004 victory came at four under, with only Goosen and Phil Mickelson finishing under par that week. The set-up is not subtle, and it gives little cover to players who are already fighting their swings.
McIlroy’s week at Muirfield Village had enough positives to suggest he is close, but not enough to say the driver problem is gone. He ranked 10th in Strokes Gained: Approach and 11th off the tee, yet he still hit only 53 percent of his fairways. On Sunday, McIlroy was plain about it: “Off the tee still wasn’t where I want it to be.”
He went further than that, saying Shinnecock’s fairways are a little wider than the ones at Muirfield Village, but adding that he still needs to work on his driving. McIlroy also explained the miss in more technical terms, saying, “I get a little bit underneath the plane on the way down and then from there I try to drag the handle to match it up, and then I get toe strikes.” It is the kind of admission that sounds honest and worrying at the same time, because the problem is not hidden and the fix is not simple.
Scheffler arrives with a different kind of baggage. He entered the Memorial after a frustrating near-miss at the CJ Cup Byron Nelson and has six top-three finishes without a win in the four months since the American Express, even if he did win in his first start in 2026. He is the two-time defending champion at Muirfield Village, which means the form is there in flashes, but not in a way that removes doubt before a major that punishes anything less than control.
The next stop is Shinnecock Hills, where the U.S. Open will not wait for either of them to sort it out. McIlroy’s ball-striking numbers show he is not far off, but his own words make clear the driver is still the weak link. For Scheffler, the challenge is different: convert near-misses into a result that can survive the week’s hardest test. At Shinnecock, both of them will find out quickly whether the Memorial was a bridge to better golf or just another stop with unanswered questions.
