Team USA made a solid start to their bid for an 11th consecutive Presidents Cup victory by building a 3-2 lead in Thursday's fourballs session against the International Team. Brandt Snedeker's side have historically dominated the biennial contest but were presented with a tough test on the opening day at Medinah Country Club, where the Internationals won two of the five points on offer. World No 1 Scottie Scheffler ended his winless record alongside Sam Burns by edging a final-hole thriller against Min Woo Lee and Sungjae Im, following Justin Thomas partnering rookie Jackson Koivun to a 4&3 win over Corey Conners and Nico Echavarria.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player The all-Japanese pairing of Hideki Matsuyama and Ryo Hisatsune despatched Cameron Young and Xander Schauffele 3&1, before Wyndham Clark and Collin Morikawa beat Ryan Fox and Adam Scott 3&2 to ensure Team USA would win the session. The United States have led after the opening day in nine of the last 10 Presidents Cups, although Tom Kim and Si Woo Kim reduced their advantage by seeing off Chris Gotterup and Patrick Cantlay 3&2 in the bottom match. A high-scoring top match saw Scheffler win the first with a 15-foot birdie, before Burns holed from 10 feet to match Lee's monster putt from off the green.
Both teams then birdied the next two holes. Im won the fifth with a birdie, while both teams made two on the par-three ninth, with Burns rolling in from nearly 20 feet after Lee had fired his tee shot close. The Internationals then squandered several chances to move ahead.
They eventually took the lead when Im converted a 10-foot birdie at the 13th, but Burns immediately responded with a close-range birdie at the next. The teams remained tied until both Internationals bogeyed the 17th, handing the hole to Team USA. Scheffler then splashed out of the greenside bunker at the par-four last to within inches of the hole, securing the par and sealing a first win together for him and Burns at either the Presidents Cup or Ryder Cup.
"We just did our best to stay in it," Scheffler said. "I felt like both teams got off to pretty hot starts today and we cooled off a little bit off that. Sam [Burns] hit probably the shot of the match there on 14.
"We lost 13 to go one down and then he hit one in there to a couple feet. I felt like that was really a big moment for us as a team, and he stepped up when we needed him to." Thomas extended his perfect Presidents Cup fourballs record with an impressive partnership alongside 21-year-old rookie Koivun, with the American pair never trailing as they secured the first point of this year's contest. The pair won three holes in a four-hole stretch from the third before Conners claimed the seventh, with the gap remaining at two until Thomas closed out a seventh consecutive fourballs victory by birdieing the 14th and 15th.
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