Phil Mickelson didn’t have the best day on the Blue Monster course at Doral. He knew he was in for a tough battle having to go against Brooks Koepka, the reigning PGA Champion and a winner last week at the LIV Golf Jeddah event.
Mickelson even joked about the matchup earlier, saying “Brooks is not the guy I’d choose to play.’’
And it proved to be a tough encounter, as Mickelson quickly went down three holes, battled back to within one, but could never again pull even, eventually losing 6 and 4 on the first day of the LIV Golf Miami Team Championship.
But Mickelson will live to play another day anyway.
That’s because the format at the team championship allowed for his teammates on the squad he captains, the HyFlyers, to bail him out, leading to a semifinals matchup on Saturday in the $50 million season-ending event.
His reward is a match against Dustin Johnson and the top LIV team, the 4Aces.
“The Aces are the strongest team on LIV, they won it last year,’’ Mickelson said. “They’ve led throughout the year. But I’m really proud of my team today and the effort our guys made down the stretch. I’ve got a lot of work to do on my own game, but I’ve got a team that has made this fun. We’re looking forward to the opportunity.’’
Mickelson’s team advanced because teammate Cameron Tringale defeated Koepka’s Smash teammate Jason Kokrak, 2 and 1, while the foursomes team of Brendan Steele and James Piot defeated the Smash team of Chase Koepka and Matthew Wolff, 1 up.
There were three quarterfinals matches on Friday, with two points needed to advance.
There was another upset that saw the Cleeks team, captained by Martin Kaymer, defeat Cam Smith’s Rippers team.
While Kaymer lost to Smith on the first extra hole—after birdies on his final three holes to tie the match—his teammates came through to advance. Richard Bland defeated Marc Leishman, 4 and 3, while Graeme McDowell and Bernd Wiesberger went three extra holes to defeat Matt Jones and Jed Morgan.
That means two of the more prominent captains in LIV Golf—Koepka and Smith—will get Saturday off.
All 12 teams will compete on Sunday but the four who lost Friday—Smash, Majestics, Ripper and Iron Heads—can finish no better than ninth.
The four losing teams on Saturday will be able to do no better than fifth. The four teams that win Saturday will play for the overall team title.
So Saturday’s semifinals matchups will see the 4Aces, captained by Johnson, take on Mickelson’s HyFlyers; the Crushers, captained by Bryson DeChambeau, take on Kaymer’s Cleeks; the Torque, captained by Joaquin Niemann, take on Louis Oosthuizen’s Stinger; and the RangeGoats, captained by Bubba Watson, take on Sergio Garcia’s Fireballs.
In each match, the captains square off, with the same format as Friday. One other singles match and one foursomes match for a total of three points.
