Scottie Scheffler left the 3M Open with another runner-up finish, and he left with a simple verdict on the week: the fans were great. The 30-year-old finished second at TPC Twin Cities after a closing push that still left him three shots behind Jackson Koivun, who claimed his maiden PGA Tour victory on his third professional start.
The result mattered because Scheffler was not just chasing another trophy. He had played in each of the last two weeks across the pond before coming to Minnesota for the first tournament on the PGA Tour schedule after The Open Championship, and this was the first time he had played the event before. For a player who already won his first start of the season at The American Express, the stop in Blaine was another chance to turn a strong week into a finish that matched it.
Instead, Scheffler had to settle for second for the fifth time this season. He shot rounds of 64 and 63 over the weekend and said he knew he would need something really low just to get into range. He did get close enough to hear the crowd respond, calling the week tremendous, the tournament really solid and saying he heard cheers while he was playing.
That praise sat alongside the harder truth of the leaderboard. Scheffler said he needed a low front nine to put pressure on Koivun, but he only got to 3 under on the front and could not make the early surge he wanted. He pointed to a rough stretch on the back nine Friday and the front nine Saturday as the part of the week that cost him most, and the math of the finish never changed: six shots back to start the day, three shots back of second and still short at the end.
The week gives Scheffler another top finish, but not the one that changes the tone of his season. With the FedEx Cup playoffs next month, the question now is not whether he is playing well enough to contend. It is whether he can turn one more strong Sunday into a win before the second-place finishes start to define the year.
