United States completes record Sunday comeback to win 11th straight Presidents Cup

The United States completed the largest final-day comeback in Presidents Cup history on Sunday, overturning a three-point deficit to defeat the International team 17-13 at Medinah Country Club outside Chicago. The victory, sealed when Jacob Bridgeman beat Min Woo Lee 1 up in the day's final match, extended the Americans' unbeaten streak in the biennial competition to 11 editions dating back to 2005.

Entering Sunday singles, the International team led by three points after three days of foursomes and four-ball play, a margin that had ballooned to four points at one stage on Saturday. The Americans erased it by winning nine of 12 singles matches and halving a 12th that was already academic, a result the PGA Tour's own recap of the final round called the biggest Sunday rout in the tournament's history.

The numbers

The final tally of 17-13 leaves the United States with a 14-1-1 record across 16 editions of the Presidents Cup since it began in 1994. The International team's lone victory came at Royal Melbourne in 1998, with a tie in South Africa in 2003 the only other blemish on America's record. Sunday's singles session alone produced 9.5 of a possible 12 points for the home side, according to the official Presidents Cup scoring page, which tracked the point-by-point swing as morning matches turned in the Americans' favor.

Individually, Jackson Koivun, the 21-year-old rookie and reigning NCAA player of the year out of Auburn, finished the week unbeaten at 2-0-1, the only player on either side to go through without a loss. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler went 3-1-0, and Tom Kim led all International players at 4-1-0, a breakdown detailed in the tour's player-by-player accounting of every match.

How the comeback unfolded

The Americans had been outplayed for three days at Medinah. The International team, captained by Geoff Ogilvy, won three of five fourball matches Thursday and swept all five foursomes matches Friday, building a lead that appeared to put the trophy within reach for a side that has won the event only once in its history. Saturday's four-ball session trimmed the U.S. deficit only slightly, leaving American captain Brandt Snedeker's team needing a historic Sunday to retain the cup.

They got it. Two matches proved pivotal on the back nine: two-time major champion Collin Morikawa flipped his match from behind, and Koivun overturned a two-down deficit through 10 holes against Si Woo Kim, winning three consecutive holes before closing out a 2-up victory. Patrick Cantlay added a momentum-building birdie from just inside 60 feet on the par-3 16th to beat Adam Scott, and Bridgeman's par putt from three feet on the final green delivered the clinching point. The full sweep of Sunday storylines is laid out in the tour's account of Koivun's breakout week.

Who was involved

Scheffler opened the American surge with a 2-and-1 win over Nico Echavarria, a match that included a sportsmanship moment when Scheffler conceded a long par putt to his opponent after a spectator shouted during Echavarria's swing. Snedeker, the U.S. captain, had trailed for most of the week after his side struggled in the alternate-format sessions, while Ogilvy's International team — again missing a signature win that has eluded the format since 1998 — saw Kim post the week's best individual record. Full final standings and the tournament's overall leaderboard are posted on the PGA Tour's Presidents Cup tournament page.

"I cannot get over what Jackson Koivun did today," Snedeker said. "I put him in a really tough spot out there because we thought he could handle it, and sure enough, he did. He went out there and looked like the stud."

Reaction

Snedeker had predicted an unlikely finish the night before the comeback began. "I told the guys last night that funny stuff happens here," he said. "Medinah has a history of funny things happening." Koivun, playing in his first Presidents Cup after turning professional out of Auburn, downplayed his own role in the rally. "I think I'll just take a lot of knowledge that I can be out here and I can compete," he said. "It's just exciting being able to call these guys my friends." Ogilvy was gracious in defeat, noting the scale of the task his team had faced. "It's a very difficult thing to beat the U.S. in singles in the U.S.," he said. "They're great players, and the crowd came out for them." Si Woo Kim, who lost the decisive singles match to Koivun, credited the rookie directly, saying he had "never was under pressure pretty much every hole, even the last few holes."

What happens next

The result keeps the Presidents Cup trophy in American hands for at least two more years. The next edition is scheduled for 2028 at Kingston Heath Golf Club in Melbourne, part of a run of Australian hosting rights detailed on the tour's list of future Presidents Cup sites, where the International team will have home-course advantage as it continues to search for only its second victory in the competition's history. For the Americans, Sunday's rally offers a case study for the U.S. Ryder Cup effort, with several of Medinah's singles heroes, including Scheffler, Morikawa and Cantlay, likely to anchor that team as well in future cycles.