[Photo: Getty images]
The Australian contingent at this week’s Truist Championship, a Signature Event on the PGA Tour, is spearheaded by recent Houston Open winner Min Woo Lee after former world No.1 Jason Day withdrew, leaving Lee, Cam Davis and Adam Scott as the green-and-gold players at the Philadelphia Cricket Club. Rising star Karl Vilips is currently an alternate to the elite field.
The field will be stacked full of big names, none more than Rory McIlroy, who makes his first 72-hole individual strokeplay start after capturing his fifth major at the Masters to complete the career grand slam.
The tournament is being staged for the first time at the historic Wissahickon Course at The Philadelphia Cricket Club, an AW Tillinghast design (1922) known for its devilish greens and dramatic closing stretch. It marks the Tour’s return to Philadelphia for the first time since the BMW Championship in 2018.
The trophy for the tournament is a silver cricket bat.
Lee enters the week as one of just two Australians to win on the PGA Tour in 2025, joining Vilips, the 23-year-old phenom from Perth who captured his maiden title earlier this season at the Puerto Rico Open. Although an alternate, Vilips’ rapid rise has cemented him as one of Australia’s brightest golf prospects.
Scott, the 2013 Masters champion, brings veteran experience to the field as does Sydney native Davis, a winner in Detroit in 2024.
Even though it’s only 65,09 metres in total, not a long course for elite PGA Tour pros, the Wissahickon Course is no pushover. With greens that offer no straight putts and a finish featuring a 11-metre par 3 to a treacherously bunkered green, followed by the punishing “Great Hazard” on 15 and a nerve-testing par-4 18th, precision will be critical.
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Final four holes (per PGA Tour.com)
No. 15, 505 metres, par 5: A three-quarter-acre complex of bunkers and mounds – Tillinghast’s “Great Hazard” – fills up the fairway, 335 yards off the tee. It will be a factor for the very longest hitters playing downwind; otherwise, it only comes into play for those who have badly missed the fairway off the tee and pitch out. The green here, among the smallest on the course, is well defended up front and on both sides with sand, to the point where players must hit their long or mid-iron on a high trajectory. This is the last good birdie opportunity in the round.
No. 16, 197 metres, par 3: Slightly downhill, to a green protected up front by a tiny stream. The putting surface here, according to The Philadelphia Cricket Club Director of Golf Jim Smith Jr., “Doesn’t offer a flat putt anywhere, least of all inside five feet.”
No. 17, 455 metres, par 4: A slightly elevated railway line down the entire right side of the hole looms as an ominous obstacle and subliminally leads players to favor the left side on the drive and approach shot.
No. 18, 472 metres, par 4: The narrowest landing area off the tee on the course thanks to three flanking fairway bunkers and a green whose entrance is pinched on both sides by sand.
Meanwhile, on the opposite field event, the Myrtle Beach Classic, Aaron Baddeley is the only Australian teeing up at the South Carolina event.
