More than a major on the line for Canadian golfers at Valhalla

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LOUISVILLE, Ky. — It’s a major week in more ways than one for Canadian golfers in the PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club.

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With just five weeks left before Olympic men’s golf qualifying closes, the race to represent Canada later this summer is the closest in the world.

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Barring a crazy scenario that sees Canadians winning basically every tournament in the next month and somehow getting three or even four players into the top 15 of the world rankings by the June 17 cutoff, there will be two Canucks playing in Paris. The top two Canadians on the Official World Golf Rankings (unless three or more are in top-15) will earn spots on the team.

On the strength of two PGA Tour victories in the past year, Nick Taylor is the clear frontrunner for top spot at 26th in the world.

“More than anything I’d love to be in the Olympics and in the Presidents Cup and being in that position now is great, but there are a lot of big tournaments between now and then and it’s easy to get ahead of yourself,” Taylor told Postmedia after winning the Waste Management Phoenix Open in February.

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It’s after Taylor that things get very interesting.

Heading into the season’s second major, Corey Conners, ranked 49th in the world, holds the second spot.

Hot on his tail, though, is Adam Hadwin, ranked 51st. Three spots further back is Taylor Pendrith, whose win two weeks ago at the Byron Nelson saw him jump into the top-100, all the way to a career-high 54th in the world.

It doesn’t end there, because after a slow start to 2024, Mackenzie Hughes has three top-15 finishes in his past five starts, including a T3 at the Valspar Championship and a T6 last week at the elevated Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow. Hughes enter the PGA Championship ranked 63rd in the world.

PGA Tour winner Adam Svensson is ranked 83rd, but Pendrith already has shown what a win can do for a player’s world ranking, so the 30-year-old can’t be counted out yet.

The Canadian men are all trending in the right direction as they arrive at Valhalla, and odds are good that the two men slotted to reperesent Canada will look different when they leave next Monday.

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