From Scottie Scheffler at TPC Sawgrass to Bryson DeChambeau next tournament, the 2025 slate is loaded.
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With all of golf’s 2024 events now officially in the rear-view mirror, it is rightly time to look forward through the windshield at what awaits us in 2025. The men visit likely the toughest major golf course on the planet. The women visit a country that rarely hosts the best in the world. We’ve got a major champion competing in India, a potential playing-captain at the Ryder Cup and maybe the greatest course on the planet hosting the best players who can’t compete for money.
Yes, all that is coming for us in 2025, and I’ve done you a solid. I’ve hand-picked the nine events I’m most excited for this coming year, with selections in January, February, March, May, June, July, August and September.
9 Events I’m Most Hyped for in 2025 (chronological order)
International Series India Jan. 30-Feb. 2
Yes, I’m talking about an Asian Tour event. Bryson DeChambeau is preparing to be the first reigning major champion to compete in an event in India, when he starts his 2025 at the International Series India event. No, you won’t be able to watch it on TV. And yes, it’ll largely take place in the middle of the night in America. But that’s not the point. The point is that one of the game’s most popular stars is visiting Gurugram, India.
While that may not fill the cup of every golf fan, it should at least serve as a barometer for the game’s appreciation in India. We have spent many of the previous 30 months talking about creating a global golf calendar, where the biggest names in the game visit new corners of the world. Well, here’s a great start.
AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am Jan. 30-Feb.2
The 2024 Pebble Beach Pro-Am was supposed to be the best one yet. It had the best field, a newly trimmed down amount of amateurs, and still one of the greatest courses in the world with a $20 million purse on hand. But then Mother Nature wreaked havoc, shortening the event to just 54 holes, during which Wyndham Clark shot a preferred-lies 60 and didn’t have to bother playing a fourth round. It felt like the classic Pro-Am was taken from us last year. Here’s hoping for great weather and a legitimate battle down the greatest meeting of land and sea next year.
TGL’s Triple Header February 17
When 24 of the best golfers in the world break out and do something together, we all have to pay attention. They’ve earned that amount of respect, in an oddly similar way to how we needed to pay attention to the launch of LIV Golf in 2022.
I just want to understand how solid of an entity the TGL can be. Will the golfers care enough to be entertaining? Will the golf be good, or similar to what we saw at The Showdown earlier this month? There seems to be no better day to analyze the product than when it’s a month old and will be on TV for about nine hours.
Scottie goes for Players three-peat March 13-16
It feels like a distant memory now, but the round of the year came in March when Scottie Scheffler shot a final round 63 at TPC Sawgrass to win his second-consecutive Players Championship. No one had accomplished that feat before, which means no one has ever won three straight Players. Scheffler will have the chance to claim PGA Tour immortality if he can win in Ponte Vedra for the third straight year. Color me intrigued.
U.S. Women’s Open at Erin Hills May 29-June 1
It is partly shameful to not list a women’s event prior to this one, but the beginning part of the LPGA schedule is sometimes difficult to track, given numerous events in Asia during the spring. But the biggest event in the women’s game is landing at a fantastic venue for 2025.
The U.S. Women’s Open will be played at Erin Hills, where Brooks Koepka won the 2017 U.S. Open, launching his superstardom at a time when most people didn’t know who Brooks Koepka was. Look for Erin to play plenty long for the ladies, and for the scoring to be much closer to even par that week. (It’s a good major championship venue, and I’m glad it’s getting the chance to prove itself again.)
The Open at Royal Portrush July 17-20
With all due respect to Oakmont, which will host the U.S. Open in June, I’m locked on Royal Portrush —an equally great (and likely even better) golf course — as it will host The Open in July. The last time The Open visited Northern Ireland, we had Rory McIlroy’s teary serenade from fans. We had Shane Lowry’s triumph for the Emerald Isle. (We even had Shane’s grandmother up on stage at the ceremony that followed in his home town.) We had Tommy Fleetwood’s best effort and Brooks Koepka lurking. All of that in a tiny beach town on the Atlantic Ocean, when the sun sets at 9:30 p.m. We’ll take half of that in 2025 and be happy.
U.S. Women’s Amateur at Bandon Dunes Aug. 4-10
It is a glaring hole in my own resume that I haven’t visited Bandon Dunes, but that’s between me, Bandon and the peaks of a supply and demand curve. Luckily for me — and hopefully many others — we at least get a glimpse of how one of the best public courses in the world looks via the U.S. Women’s Amateur. There’s something special — even if it’s not quite the real thing — about your TV planting you into the foggy dunescape for some late-afternoon golf played by the best women’s ams in the world.
Walker Cup at Cypress Point Sept. 6-7
If you consider all the elite golf events — which is to consider the amateur events as well — then 2025 is really going to be a banner year, partly because the Walker Cup is visiting Cypress, widely regarded as the second-best course in the world.
Pebble Beach’s private neighbor will open its doors to some the best amateurs on the planet for a very rare experience. Add it to St. Andrews (Dunhill), Oakmont (U.S. Open), and Augusta National (the Masters) and you’ve got four of the top 10 in our world ranking hosting events next year.
Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black Sept. 26-28
This list would be insufficient without including the biggest event of the year, which arrives in late September on Long Island. Team Europe will bring its winning team from 2023, as well as its morals — taking the high ground best they can on the topic of pay-for-play.
Sean Zak is a writer at GOLF Magazine and just published his first book, which follows his travels in Scotland during the most pivotal summer in the game’s history.
