Solheim Cup preview: Who will win? What are each team’s strengths?
Credit to Author: Mark Schlabach| Date: Fri, 13 Sep 2024 08:39:55 EST
Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, golf fans will get to watch the Solheim Cup in consecutive years.
The competition between women’s teams from the U.S. and Europe traditionally happens every other year. But after the 2020 Ryder Cup was postponed a year because of the pandemic, moving the men’s event to odd-numbered years, the Solheim Cup is being played in consecutive years to get on an even-year schedule.
That means the U.S. squad didn’t have to wait as long to try to wrestle the Cup away from the Europeans, who retained the trophy with a 14-14 tie in Finca Cortesin, Spain, last year.
“We got some unfinished business,” world No. 1 golfer Nelly Korda said this week.
Although the U.S. has won 10 of the 18 competitions, it hasn’t come out on top since a 16½-11½ victory at Des Moines Golf & Country Club in Iowa in 2017.
“Some people have asked me what one word would be to describe Team USA this year, and I’m just going to say ‘hungry,’ because Nelly and I obviously being on the same amount of Solheim Cups and not necessarily getting the job done last year, kind of leaves not necessarily the best taste in your mouth,” Megan Khang said. “Luckily, we didn’t have to wait two years. We have this year to kind of get back at it, and I can tell you now we’re more hungry than ever.”
Here are some of the biggest storylines at the Solheim Cup, which tees off Friday at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Virginia:
Jump ahead:
Team Europe
Team U.S.
Our prediction
Why they’ll win
The Europeans have been in possession of the Solheim Cup for much of the past five years. After falling in back-to-back matches in 2015 and 2017, the Europeans won 14½-13½ at Gleneagles in Scotland in 2019 and 15-13 at Inverness Club in Toledo, Ohio in 2021. After last year’s tie in Spain, the European squad celebrated as if it had won.
Eight golfers from last year’s European team qualified to run it back this week, and Suzann Pettersen used two of her three captain’s picks to bring back two more — Sweden’s Anna Nordqvist and Denmark’s Emily Kristine Pedersen. Rookies Esther Henseleit (Germany) and Albane Valenzuela (Switzerland) are the only newcomers.
The Europeans will be looking for their third victory in the past four Solheim Cups held in the U.S.
“I think playing away, you’re always an underdog,” Pettersen said. “I think that’s how we’ve always looked at it. Yeah, if you look at the previous three Solheims, we’ve come out on the high side, and we’re going to try and keep that going for sure. At the same time, being away, I’m very happy to kind of leave the pressure [on] the Americans to say they are the home favorites.”
All but two of the European team’s 12 members have winning records at the Solheim Cup.
England’s Charley Hull (12-7-3), Ireland’s Leona Maguire (7-2-1) and Spain’s Carlota Ciganda (11-8-4) have been the toughest outs in the team competition. It’s an experienced squad with a combined 77-55-16 record in Solheim Cup matches and 79 points earned. Seven golfers on the European roster will be competing in at least their fourth Solheim Cup.
Weaknesses
The American team would seem to have an advantage playing at home with a more talented roster from top to bottom. Sweden’s Linn Grant and Maguire were the only European team members who won a Ladies European Tour event this season. Hull, ranked 12th in the world, hasn’t won since October 2022 but had four top-25s at majors this season.
Boutier, the highest-ranked European golfer at No. 10 in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Ranking, won four times last year, including her first major championship at the Evian Championship in her native France. This season, however, she didn’t finish higher than a tie for 19th in the five majors.
In fact, eight of the top 12 European golfers failed to finish in the top 10 at a major this season. Stark was runner-up at the Chevron, and Grant tied for ninth at the Women’s PGA Championship and 10th at the AIG Women’s Open.
“Obviously, when you look on paper, the U.S. team is very strong, and I don’t think it’s bad going into this week knowing that we have to give up like a good fight to keep the Cup,” Grant said. “So I think we’re all very excited to go out and be aggressive from the start this time. We were slow last year. And just give it our all.”
Rookie assessment
Henseleit was one of the European squad’s better performers this season with two top 10s in majors — she was solo seventh at the Chevron Championship and tied for seventh at the Evian Championship. She also was the silver medalist at the Olympics in Paris, carding a 6-under 66 in the final round to finish two strokes behind gold medalist Lydia Ko of New Zealand. Then Henseleit was runner-up in the Scottish Open last month.
The 2019 LET Rookie of the Year and Order of Merit champion started this past season ranked 111th in the world but climbed to 30th with the best campaign of her career. Her fiancée, Reece Phillips, works as her caddie and swing coach. Her improvement on the greens after working with Scottish putting coach David Orr helped spark her breakthrough.
“It’s been a lot of fun,” Henseleit said. “I felt like my hard work over the last few years kind of paid off and everything came together a little bit. It’s been great to see some good results coming in. It definitely helps my confidence.”
Valenzuela, 26, was born in New York to a Mexican father and French mother. She became a Swiss native at age 14 and played college golf at Stanford. Valenzuela was a two-time runner-up in the U.S. Women’s Amateur in 2017 and 2019. She represented Switzerland three times at the Olympics and is the first Swiss golfer to compete in the Ryder Cup or Solheim Cup.
In 17 starts on the LPGA Tour this season, Valenzuela had six top-25 finishes and two top 10s. She was runner-up at the Honda LPGA Thailand in February.
Golfers who should play all five matches
Pettersen relied heavily on three players in Spain: Grant, Maguire and Pedersen, who each played in all five matches. Grant and Maguire went 3-2, while Pedersen went 2-2-1. They were a combined 5-0-1 in four-ball matches, while Maguire was the only one who won her singles match, carding five birdies and an eagle to take down Rose Zhang 4 & 3 on Sunday.
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Grant and Maguire had exceptional form at times this season. On June 9, Grant captured the Volvo Cars Scandinavian Mixed, which also included competitors from the DP World Tour. Maguire became the first Irish woman to claim an LET event when she won the Aramco Team Series tournament in London on July 5.
Maguire is one of only five European players who won at least seven of their first 10 matches at the Solheim Cup, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
“She’s fiery on the golf course,” European team vice captain Mel Reid said of Maguire. “I think you see that. She’s very passionate. She loves match play. She loves [the] Solheim Cup. She loves looking her competitor in the face saying, ‘I’m going to beat you,’ and she wears that extremely well in the team.
“She never gives up. She has so much grit and determination. It’s exactly the kind of player you want on your team. And she’s not a long player, and I think that’s what frustrates the competitors as well, is that she just gets it done [without] hitting it very far.”
Hero pick
Can Ciganda deliver for the Europeans again? The 34-year-old was the only Spanish golfer who competed at Finca Cortesin last year, and she delivered with a 4-0 record. In Sunday singles, she won the 16th and 17th hole to knock off Korda 2 & 1 for the 14th point that retained the Solheim Cup for the European team.
This week, Ciganda will be looking to become the first golfer to win at least five straight matches at the Solheim Cup since Caroline Hedwall and Hull won six straight in 2013 and 2015. Her best finishes this year were a tie for third at the Ford Championship and solo sixth at the Chevron Championship.
Risky pick
For the second Solheim Cup in a row, the European team roster is loaded with Swedish golfers. Pettersen used one of her three captain’s picks on Nordqvist, who is competing in her ninth consecutive Solheim Cup. She’s competing as a vice captain this week.
According to Elias Sports Bureau, only two other golfers appeared in the competition nine or more times in a row: Europe’s Laura Davies played in 12 straight from 1990 to 2011 and Cristie Kerr was on every U.S. squad from 2002 to 2017.
Nordqvist, ranked 72nd in the world, had a 1-3 record in Spain last year, going 0-2 in foursomes and 0-1 in a four-ball match. She defeated Jennifer Kupcho 2 & 1 in a singles match.
Nordqvist has a 15-13-3 record in the Solheim Cup, but she missed the cut in four of her past seven starts on the LPGA Tour.
Why they’ll win
History would seem to be on the American team’s side — neither side has won or retained the Solheim Cup four straight times since its inception in 1990. The U.S. team won three times in a row from 1994 to 1998 and 2005 to 2009. And the Americans will have the crowd on its side in northern Virginia.
Again, on the surface, the U.S. team would seem to be far more talented and accomplished than its opponent. There are three American golfers ranked in the top 10 of the world ranking: Korda (No. 1), Lilia Vu (No. 2) and Rose Zhang (No. 9). Three other golfers on the U.S. team — No. 14 Laura Coughlin, No. 18 Ally Ewing and No. 21 Megan Khang — are ranked in the top 25.
The average world ranking for the 12 golfers on the U.S. team is 25.8 compared to 42 for the European squad. Seven of the golfers on the U.S. squad had at least one top-10 finish in a major — Ewing had the most with three.
Korda was the best women’s golfer in the world in 2024, winning six times in a seven-start stretch earlier this season, including her second major championship at the Chevron Championship. Vu returned from a back injury and picked up her fifth LPGA victory at the Meijer LPGA Classic on June 16. The two-time major champion tied for second at the Women’s PGA Championship and Women’s British Open.
Weaknesses
The only American golfers who have tasted victory in the Solheim Cup are Thompson, who was on winning teams in 2015 and 2017, and Alison Lee, who was on the 2015 squad. Korda, Ewing and Khang were part of the past three teams that came up short against the Europeans.
“It was a concern last year,” U.S. team captain Stacy Lewis said. “That’s the one thing we have going against us, but at some point they’re going to win one and at some point they’re going to get over the hump, just the odds of it.”
Lewis has relied on data more than Pettersen, who seems to go with her gut in making many decisions. Last year, the U.S. team blitzed the Europeans 4-0 in the Friday morning foursomes. The Americans went 6-2 in the alternate shot matches, the first time since 2007 that they had a winning mark in that format.
The Europeans have flipped the script in the four-ball matches. In 2017 and 2019, the U.S. team had a seven-point advantage in four-ball. Europe has been five points better in the last two Solheim Cups, including a 6-2 record last year.
“We put a lot of emphasis last year on alternate shot, which you guys saw in the result,” Lewis said. “Looking back, was it maybe too much? Probably. So we’re trying to find that balance this year of creating those great alternate shot pairings, but also making sure we have some great best ball pairings as well. So just trying to find that balance.”
Rookie assessment
Like the European team, there are only two rookies on the U.S. squad — Coughlin and Sarah Schmelzel.
Coughlin, 31, enjoyed a breakthrough in her seventh season on the PGA Tour. She claimed her first two victories at the CPKC Women’s Open on July 28 and the ISPS Handa Scottish Women’s Open on Aug. 18. She tied for third at the Chevron Championship and was solo fourth at the Evian Championship.
The former Virginia All-American should be a crowd favorite at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club this week. She leads the LPGA with 269 birdies and is fourth in greens in regulation (74%).
Schmelzel, 30, grew up in Arizona and played college golf at South Carolina. She hired a new swing coach and putting coach before the season, and the changes paid off. She had seven top 10s in 21 starts on tour this season, including her first runner-up at the Blue Bay LPGA on March 7. She’s one of the better ball strikers on tour and avoids bogeys (15% of holes played).
Golfers who should play all five matches
The U.S. squad didn’t have a single player compete in five matches in Spain last year. Khang was the top performer with 3½ points, going 3-0-1 over three days. She paired with Thompson to win two foursomes matches, then set the tone in singles by taking down Grant 1 up in the opening match on Sunday.
There were five rookies on last year’s team — Vu, Allisen Corpuz, Andrea Lee, Zhang and Cheyenne Knight — and Lewis leaned on her more experienced golfers. Vu, Lee and Zhang struggled in their first Solheim Cup, going a combined 2-7-2.
Hero pick
Thompson was a risky pick a year ago, when Lewis chose her during one of the worst seasons of her LPGA career. Thompson missed the cut in eight of her 11 starts on tour in 2023, but Lewis showed a ton of confidence when she rolled her out with Khang in the opening match.
Thompson responded by picking up three points with a 3-1 record. She held off Pedersen 2 & 1 in the final singles match on Sunday.
It will probably be Thompson’s final Solheim Cup. A 15-time winner around the world, Thompson has a 9-7-7 record in the event.
Thompson has been in better form this season with four top 10s in 14 starts, including a tie for ninth at the PGA Women’s Championship. She ranks 13th on tour in strokes gained: putting (.730) and has been exceptionally good inside 20 feet.
“Lexi has definitely changed women’s golf,” U.S. team vice captain Paula Creamer said. “You can tell she’s so happy right now. I think that making that decision earlier this year [to retire] has definitely helped her enjoy these moments and enjoy being on a team right now. She has definitely made a huge impact on the game of golf for the juniors and everything.
“She’ll definitely be missed, but she’ll always be there, that’s for sure. I don’t think she’s going too far away from the game, just not out here.”
Risky pick
Alison Lee earned her way back on the U.S. team through her world ranking, which is a redemption story in itself after she lost her LPGA card earlier in her career. Last year, she won a second Aramco Team Series event in Riyadh and lost in a playoff to Minjee Lee at the BMW Ladies Championship.
The former UCLA star climbed to No. 14 in the world earlier this season — after she had slipped to 353rd five years ago.
It’s Lee’s first Solheim Cup in nine years. She has plenty of scar tissue from her only other appearance. As a 20-year-old rookie in St. Leon-Rot, Germany in 2015, Lee and Brittany Lincicome were playing Pettersen and Charley Hull in a fourballs match.
With the American squad trailing by four points, Lee had a birdie putt to go 1 up in the match with one hole to play. She missed and scooped up her ball, which stopped less than 2 feet from the hole.
Immediately, Pettersen protested that the European duo hadn’t conceded the putt. An official agreed. The Europeans won the next hole for a 2-up victory, leaving Lee and Lincicome in tears.
The U.S. team rallied to win 8½ points in singles for a 14½-13½ victory, the biggest comeback in Solheim Cup history.
Pettersen was heavily criticized for not conceding the putt. She apologized the Monday after the match.
“I’m not going to lie, I don’t think about it too often,” Lee said Tuesday. “It was a very long time ago. I would say in the moment it was tough. I was very intimidated at the time, like I said. I was a rookie on tour. I didn’t really know any of the girls on my team either. I wasn’t really good friends with them.
“I just felt like the newbie, young girl, who kind of made it on the team, and everyone thankfully just rallied behind me and were so warm and welcoming and did everything they could to support me.”
Lee, 29, said she has never talked to Pettersen about the incident.
“I mean, I’m not going to lie, I haven’t really talked to her at all since then,” she said.
The Americans do indeed have unfinished business at the Solheim Cup, and they’ll end their drought with a 15-13 victory. Thompson will secure the winning point in Sunday singles in her final appearance in the event.