COVERAGE: Surging Koepka Steals First-Round Show at LIV Chicago

While he can’t win LIV Golf’s individual championship, Brooks Koepka is still plenty capable of grabbing the spotlight at any time.

And at a challenging Bolingbrook Golf Club that conceded just 10 scores at 2 under or better in Friday’s first round at LIV Chicago, the five-time major champion went deep with an 8-under 62 that has him four shots clear of second-place Paul Casey.

“Yeah, it was interesting,” Koepka told the assembled press after birdieing five of his last six holes. “I didn’t think I hit it that good the first seven holes.

“Putted really good. Felt like I was finally making some putts with the correct speed, and it was the best putting day I’ve had in a long time.”

Koepka can only finish as high as third in the standings in this final individual tournament of the season — Jon Rahm and Joaquin Niemann are the only two in play for the top spot — but he can finish as the only LIV player with three wins in 2024 if he closes this one out. Koepka nipped Rahm in a playoff last month at the Greenbrier, and the bruising American also prevailed in Singapore at midseason.

Koepka’s got some game challengers behind him, with Crushers GC teammates Casey (-4) and Anirban Lahiri (-3) immediately trailing, followed by a group of seven at 2 under that includes fellow multi-major champs Bryson DeChambeau and Dustin Johnson, plus Patrick Reed and Niemann.

“A good player gets hot and they can shoot 62 pretty easy,” Koepka said. “There’s a bunch of guys out here that can do that. When it’s your day, it’s your day.”

While Koepka closed hot, reducing the final grouping of Niemann and Rahm to a side stage, the Chilean edged the Spaniard by one shot with a birdie-par finish. That means Torque GC captain Niemann holds a narrow projected lead in the individual standings with 36 holes remaining.

Essentially, whoever of the two that finishes higher this weekend will claim the season-long points race. The LIV rookie Rahm would prevail if the two end up tied. (England’s Tyrrell Hatton is in third, the final spot that earns a bonus.)

“Look, there’s a lot of golf to play,” Niemann said. “It’s a good start, yes, but there’s still a nice long weekend to come, so looking forward to that.

“I was trying to focus on trying to win this golf tournament. I feel if I focus on that, everything else takes care of itself. That’s kind of my mindset. Brooks played an amazing round today. It was really tricky today, so I think he’s the target now.”

This is the third year that LIV visits Chicagoland late in its season, but it’s the first time at Bolingbrook, rated the No. 1 public course in Illinois. The par-70 layout featured firm and fast fairways and, on most holes, greens that sloped outward from the middle.

The challenge of the course put the kibosh on any thoughts of a shootout, a la the previous LIV event at the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia, where seven players shot 15 under or lower and only four finished over par. On Friday, just 18 of 54 golfers — exactly a third of the field — managed to break par.

“With the fairways as bouncy as they are, I don’t recall ever playing fairways like this, short of being on a dry links golf course,” said Rahm, who scored just two birdies en route to a 1-under 69.

“It’s a tricky golf course, and with the wind added, it’s not the easiest to shoot low when you’re not feeling your best. But we’ve got two more days.”

In the event’s team standings, Crushers GC holds a four-shot advantage over Four Aces GC and Koepka’s Smash GC, bolstering their chances to carry their current top seed into next week’s team championship in greater Dallas.

Strangely enough, none of the four Crushers — DeChambeau, Casey, Lahiri and Charles Howell III — have an individual win this season. Casey currently has the best chance to end that, but he’s more concerned with the track than the lead runner.

“I’m not overly thinking about Brooks, plain and simple,” he said. “I’m trying to figure out how to get around this golf course relatively unscathed. If you can get off there with not too many wounds, that’s what it feels like. It’s sort of like Monty Python getting hacked to pieces losing an arm here and there. That’s what it feels like sometimes out there.”

Saturday’s second round tees off at 12:15 p.m. local time. I’ll have live coverage of the weekend here on PGN.