Weekly PGA Recap: Eckroat Exudes Excellence

This article is part of our Weekly PGA Recap series.

The disastrous start to the 2024 PGA Tour season continued for another week, though we're pretty sure Austin Eckroat won't see it quite like that.

Eckroat became the latest golfer from the Oklahoma State pipeline to break through in the professional ranks, winning the rain-delayed and awkwardly named Cognizant Classic in The Palm Beaches by three strokes over Erik van Rooyen and Min Woo Lee on Monday at PGA National.

The former Honda -- it's always nice when you can name that tournament in five notes -- became the 403rd event already this season to be won by a big long shot. (Okay, we're exaggerating. But just a little.)

Not only has another no-name won a tournament (sorry, Eckroat family), the weather issues from the West Coast plaguing the Tour traveled east for the start of the Florida Swing. On top of that, PGA National, annually one of the biggest beasts on the golf calendar, was turned into a cream puff. Eckroat won at 17-under-par on what was a par-71 track. That's the lowest score since the tournament has been played at PGA National beginning in 2007 -- and by three shots. Chris Kirk last year shot 14-under on a par-70 layout, where historically single digits won the tournament.

Maybe things will change this week when the Tour plays its 403rd Signature Event already in 2024. (Okay, it's only the fourth.) All the top players will be at Bay Hill for the Arnold Palmer Invitational, including Eckroat.

Eckroat was a four-time All-American at Oklahoma State from 2017 to '20, playing alongside Viktor Hovland for the first three years. Rickie Fowler also was a Cowboy, though long before those two.

The recently turned 25-year-old Eckroat had shown indications that this day was coming, tying for second at last year's Byron Nelson with another top-10 at the RSM Classic. But his biggest claim to fame before Monday came at last year's U.S. Open, where he became the sixth player to ever shoot a nine-hole 29 at the national championship. And it came in the final round, which became a 65 and a tie for 10th, earning him a return invite for this year's Open.

Eckroat of course will now play in his first Masters, too. And THE PLAYERS and the remaining Signature Events, all 403 of them. (Okay, we'll stop now).

"I'm really not sure how I feel yet," Eckroat -- who cracked the top 50 in the world rankings for the first time at No. 49 -- told reporters at PGA National. "I haven't really settled down. But just super excited and been waiting for this moment my whole life, and I don't really have a whole lot of words for it right now. But super excited."

MONDAY BACKSPIN

Erik van Rooyen
The South African has quietly been having a very good season. Though surely this co-runner-up following a final-round 63 will make things much louder. Van Rooyen was coming off a top-10 in Mexico and had three other top-25s earlier in the season. Remember, we're just two months in. van Rooyen will be in the field this week at Bay Hill and, while the field is far stronger, his strong game off the tee should work well there.

Min Woo Lee
One of the most exciting and dashing young players in the world – the type of guy the PGA Tour desperately needs these days – Lee is up to a career-high No. 31 in the world after sharing runner-up at PGA National. He shot 66-67 on the weekend and ranked fourth on the week in Strokes Gained: Approach. The Australian won the Australian PGA at the end of last year, then was third in the Aussie Open.

Cameron Young
Young might not normally be a good fit for PGA National, but with the course playing far easier this year, he thrived. He finished sixth in greens in regulation and 13th in SG: Putting. Combine that with his length off the tee and it added up to a tie for fourth, moving him to No. 21 in the world.

Shane Lowry
Lowry had played PGA National well when it was far harder, but the changes for 2024 didn't much matter, as he notched in third straight top-5 in this tournament, tying for fourth. The other side of the coin is, Lowry had the 54-hole lead and was overtaken. He could've climbed back into the top-50 in the world but stalled at No. 54. No matter, as he received a sponsor invite into Bay Hill.

Jake Knapp
Knapp just had a life-altering event occur just four days before this tournament started and yet he got his feet back on the ground and tied for fourth. That is really hard to do. The Mexico Open winner continued to absolutely pound the ball off the tee, ranking fourth in distance on the week. More impressively, he was also 13th in fairways hit.

David Skinns
The 42-year-old Englishman graduated from the Korn Ferry Tour and promptly missed his first four cuts of the season. Tying for fourth was a great way to break out of his slump. Considering that he played 14 holes on Thursday with a bent putter – after his caddie fell (true!) – it was even better. When the putter bent, Skinns was able to bend it back to within specifications of the Rules of Golf. He went on to shoot 65 that day, his best round of the week.

K.H. Lee
Lee had been struggling mightily, missing three straight cuts to almost fall out of the top-100 in the world. And by almost, we really mean almost – he was No. 100 coming in. But he tied for fourth for his best showing since the 2022 C.J. Cup. He's back up to No. 85, but that doesn't mean his game is suddenly in good shape. We'll have to wait and see.

Billy Horschel
Maybe no top player tumbled as badly last year as Horschel. He ended 2022 at No. 18 in the world but plummeted to No. 63 at the end of 2023. And in the two months since, he had fallen even more dramatically to No. 94. The 37-year-old hadn't been out of the top-100 in more than a decade. His tie for ninth at PGA National will buy him some time, now at 86th. But there's little to suggest the free-fall won't continue after this one-week hiatus.
 
Keith Mitchell
The 2019 Honda champion has a nice little run going. He arrived coming off top-20s at Phoenix and Mexico, and now he has a tie for ninth to continue his fine stretch of play.

Andrew Novak
With a tie for ninth, Novak suddenly has three top-10s in a row.

Doug Ghim
Ghim tied for 16th, his fourth straight top-20. We may be witnessing the turning point in his career. … Or not.

Ben Silverman
Silverman tied for 16th, giving him two straight top-20s and three already this season.

Rory McIlroy
McIlroy was done in by a 1-over 72 on Saturday and wound up tied for 21st. Unsurprisingly, he led the field in SG: Off-the-Tee. Also unsurprisingly, he ranked 64th in SG: Putting. He now heads to Bay Hill, where he won six years ago.

Matt Fitzpatrick
Fitzpatrick has not been at his best in 2024 and, even though he tied for 21st, that's not enough to suggest his struggles are over.

Rickie Fowler
Fowler began the final round with a top-10 a real possibility. After shooting a 1-over 72, he cratered to a tie for 41st. His terrible start to 2024 continues.

Bud Cauley
Cauley made his second start since missing years following an auto accident, and things are looking mighty promising. After finishing 65th at Phoenix, he tied for 21st at PGA National, making Cauley one of the early-season feel-good stories on the PGA Tour.

AON NEXT 10 / AON SWING 5

At the conclusion of the Cognizant, the field for this week's Arnold Palmer Invitational expanded. Some of these 15 players were already in the field, but the latest Aon Next 10 breaks down like this: Matthieu Pavon, Jake Knapp, Ludvig Aberg, Eckroat, Luke List, van Rooyen, Grayson Murray, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Will Zalatoris and Justin Thomas. As for the Swing 5: Sami Valimaki, Lee, C.T. Pan, Stephan Jaeger and Justin Lower.

MISSED CUTS

Sepp Straka, Daniel Berger, Akshay Bhatia, Eric Cole, Thomas Detry. Straka has now missed four of his past five cuts, this one coming at a course where he has excelled and won in the past. This now becomes a real concern (trust me, as someone who drafted him in the season-long RotoWire League expecting big things, I'm concerned). … Berger had been making nice strides in his comeback but the last place you'd expect him to take a step back would've been PGA National. … Since a tie for 13th at the Farmers, Bhatia has three trunk-slams in a row. … Cole was the Honda runner-up last year. After taking his first week of the season off, he returned to shoot 78-71, telling us all that he should play every single week. … As for Detry, a six-putt usually doesn't end well.