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First alternate norman xiong earns sony spot in 7-hole playoff at ‘tuesday’ qualifier.

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Norman Xiong began the week as first alternate for the Sony Open and one of over a dozen Korn Ferry Tour graduates shut out of the first non-signature event of the year.

He’s now punched his ticket.

Xiong earned the fourth and final spot in the Sony field via a Monday qualifier that was stretched into Tuesday because of heavy rain and flooding . It took Xiong seven holes to eliminate Julian Suri after both players shot 5-under 67 and got into a 7-for-2 playoff at Kapolei Golf Course about 40 minutes west of Honolulu.

Martin Trainer and Parker Coody, who like Xiong also attended the PGA Tour’s two-day rookie orientation last weekend, each shot 6-under 66 to earn the first two Sony tickets outright. Robert Streb birdied the first playoff hole and also will play at Waialae starting Thursday.

Yuki Moriyama, Ryan McCormick, John Oda and Patrick Flavin joined Suri in missing out in the playoff.

Trainer is a 32-year-old French native who won the 2019 Puerto Rico Open and is playing off past champion status this year. Coody joins his twin brother, Pierceson, as a first-year Tour pro after both competed on the Korn Ferry Tour last season. Parker Coody has made three previous Tour starts, including last spring’s Honda Classic, which he Monday’d into.

Streb, 36, is a veteran of 300 career Tour starts. He’s won twice, most recently at the 2020 RSM Classic, and finished runner-up three times.

Xiong was the 2018 Haskins Award winner as the NCAA player of the year when he was a sophomore at Oregon. Now 25, Xiong won last season on the KFT, though he’s made just 2 of 11 career PGA Tour cuts.

After Xiong got through the open qualifier, Nicholas Lindheim moved up to first alternate. However, Lindheim since had withdrawn, meaning Joe Highsmith is now next up. He’s followed by Patrick Fishburn, Mac Meissner and Tom Whitney.

This year’s Sony Open now has 17 of the 30 KFT grads from a season ago teeing it up at Waialae, though just 14 of them got in on their number . Two – Jimmy Stanger and Josh Teater – were designated sponsor invites.

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MOMENTS THAT DEFINED WOMEN'S GOLF

XIONG'S SONG

Norman Xiong’s career not what he envisioned, but one good week would rekindle confidence

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POTOMAC, Md. — One question Scottie Scheffler’s been repeatedly asked during his recent run is some version of the following: What’s given you the confidence to achieve so much, so young?

He then says it comes from seeing other college hotshots have immediate success on tour. Watching Collin Morikawa, Viktor Hovland and Matt Wolff win tournaments convinced him he could win tournaments. Ask Morikawa and he’ll say the same thing—just with Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth subbed in as examples. Young guys derive belief from watching other young guys flourish.

One name you won’t hear in any of those answers is Norman Xiong, though he too was once speeding down the Morikawa-Hovland expressway to stardom.

Xiong had an impressive amateur career; he was the top golf prospect in California as a junior, then left high school early to enroll at Oregon. In his first semester in Eugene, which again should’ve been the second semester of his high school senior year, he won the Phil Mickelson Award as the nation’s top college freshman. That summer, he won the Western Amateur and was the youngest member of the increasingly legendary 2017 Walker Cup team alongside Morikawa, Scheffler, Will Zalatoris, Maverick McNealy, Doug Ghim and Cameron Champ. In 2018, his sophomore year, he won the Jack Nicklaus and Fred Haskins awards as the top player in college golf. His coach at Oregon, Casey Martin, called him the best college player he’d seen since Tiger Woods. And he’d know what that looked like—Martin and Woods were teammates at Stanford.

RELATED: Despite big lead, Xiong holds on to win Western Amateur in 22 holes

So, Xiong turned pro in 2018, momentum at an all-time high, the world at his fingertips. He signed a big Callaway deal, got his seven sponsor’s invites and had no success at all . That may sound harsh. Pro golf can be that way.

Dylan Buell

“It’s just been a process of learning more about myself,” Xiong, still just 23, says. “What works and what doesn’t. I’ve learned so, so much about playing the game at this level.”

He learned the hard way. Xiong missed the cut in six of those seven PGA Tour events. He made 21 starts on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2019 and made just five cuts. To date, Xiong has only earned points in two Official World Golf Ranking-sanctioned events: a T-28 at the Emirates Australian Open and a T-26 at the 2018 Sanderson Farms Classic. He’s never cracked the top 1,200 in the World Ranking. At present, he has conditional status on PGA Tour Canada and has been on the road for four weeks playing PGA Tour pre-Monday qualifiers and Korn Ferry Tour Mondays.

Which makes his 65 this Monday so significant. Carrying his own bag, Xiong grabbed one of four spots in the qualifier for this week’s Wells Fargo Championship, which will mark just his second PGA Tour start since that opening stretch four years ago.

The challenge now is viewing this week as just another tournament; not a golden opportunity to jumpstart his career.

“Obviously that’s a thought, but I’m focusing on my goals on the golf course. The controllables—just want to play hard and leave it all on the course,” he said.

Xiong had a friend from back home in San Diego—he lives in Vegas these days—fly out to caddie this week. He got his first look at TPC Potomac on Tuesday.

“It feels grand—very substantial, which is nice,” Xiong said.

The same can be said for the opportunity he now has. Four good rounds are all that stands between him and a career-shifting week.

RELATED: Xiong once a can’t miss player is down, but far from out

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Norman Xiong was golf’s next superstar. Now he’s focused on a new chapter

Norman Xiong made his first PGA Tour start in over two years when he teed it up at the 3M Open on Thursday.

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BLAINE, Minn. — It’s raining at TPC Twin Cities. It won’t last long, but this, mixed with lightning in the area, is enough for a delay in the first round of the 3M Open. Norman Xiong pulls out his phone. He’s one over through eight, but only because he made a birdie right before the horn blew. Now he needs to reset. “Get my mind in the right place,” he says.

Xiong starts dialing. He keeps their identities secret. “People in my corner,” he says with a smile.

Whoever he called, it worked. After a nearly two-hour delay, Xiong returned to the par-5 18th hole — he started on the back nine — and got up and down for birdie. Then he birdied the 1st hole. Three straight, just like that. He nearly made another birdie on 3, bogeyed the 4th and made pars the rest of the way. It was an even-par 71, which doesn’t crack the top 50 but puts him in position to stick around for the weekend, if he plays well Friday.

“Honestly it was more of just me venting [on the phone], because I wasn’t in a good space mentally,” Xiong said after his round. “Kind of letting that out and being able to share, that really helped me feel better.”

Xiong [pronounced Zhong] qualified for the 3M Open after taking the final of four spots from the Monday qualifier, and Thursday was his first PGA Tour start in more than two years. Once dubbed golf’s next superstar at 19, Xiong is now 22, and he’s still trying to find it — whatever it was that made the game ridiculously easy in college that’s not actually so easy. Not all the time. Not right now. Some young stars storm onto the scene and never look back. Others take more time. More don’t pan out. Xiong, resilient as ever, is still chasing.

His path, he’s going to have a story about it, and I think he’ll figure it out if he’s willing to persevere for the long haul. Casey Martin

He’s playing without any status and trying like hell to get through Monday qualifiers — competing in about 20 PGA Tour/Korn Ferry Tour Mondays in the last two years — but grinding through weekly Mondays isn’t for the faint of heart. Everyone is hungry. Everyone is good. Really good.

But so is Xiong. So good, in fact, he didn’t stay at Oregon long. And why would he? Everything he did proved his game was ready for the next level. Oregon coach Casey Martin recruited him out of Colina Park Golf Course, a San Diego First Tee chapter, a kid with zero instruction but oozing with talent.

“He looks at the ball and whacks it,” Martin recalls. “And it just obeyed. Hard to explain. It was so effortless.”

Results came immediately. Before Collin Morikawa was Collin Morikawa and Viktor Hovland was Viktor Hovland and Matthew Wolff was Matthew Wolff, Xiong was the man to beat. He was the NCAA Freshman of the Year, won six times as a sophomore and took home the Nicklaus (DI men’s golfer of the year) and Haskins (outstanding collegiate golfer) awards. He even starred in a Walker Cup, teaming with Morikawa to win one of their 2017 matches 8 and 7. Eight and seven. “It’s really easy to play with Norman, and when you hit good shots it’s a lot easier,” Morikawa said back then.

At Oregon, Xiong’s strengths were off the tee and on the greens. He drove the ball like no one else. Martin called it freakish. One time the golf team’s statistician approached Martin about an error in their system. Surely someone can’t be hitting 90 percent of their fairways and driving it 30 yards farther than everyone else? This must be a glitch. It wasn’t.

“When you do those things at the level he was, golf is pretty easy,” Martin says. “It was a sight to behold.”

Xiong turned pro in May 2018 at age 19. There was pressure on him to succeed and expectations were high, although some of that was fueled by a quote. In April 2018, Martin told Golfweek that Xiong was the best he’s seen since Tiger Woods, whom Casey was teammates with at Stanford. That quote was gobbled up and aggregated everywhere — on websites, on telecasts, you name it. It snowballed and soon took on a new meaning, different from what was originally published.

“People run with it,” Casey says. “It came out as he’s the next Tiger. That’s not what I said.

“He was either better or more impressive than anybody. It was a fact. It wasn’t really my opinion. You are watching a 19-year-old win six times and obviously destroy these golf courses.”

Upon turning pro, Xiong hired a short-game coach to help fine-tune what he said was the weakest part of his game, inside 100 yards. At The Greenbrier, his first start, he said he felt mature enough and emotionally ready to take the next step. He didn’t think another year in college would have helped him.

“This is kind of where it all begins again,” he said back then. “I’ve definitely played some great golf in college golf and amateur golf, but it’s a different stage. It is still golf, so on the course, hopefully, I can make it the same and play the game that I have.”

But Xiong hit road bumps early. He made six PGA Tour starts in 2017-18 and missed the cut in all six. He earned his Korn Ferry Tour card for 2019 but missed 15 cuts in 21 starts. He also had three PGA Tour starts that year, and his best came in Mississippi, where he shared the 36-hole co-lead at the Sanderson Farms only to shoot 76-69 over the weekend and tie for 26th. His last PGA Tour start, before this week’s 3M Open, was a T68 at the Memorial in June 2019.

A lot has happened since. What, exactly? Well, life is complex. Golf is hard, physically and mentally. Sometimes there are lots of voices and sometimes there are none. Xiong prefers not to go too deep into his learnings over the past two years.

“It’s tough to explain,” he says. “I feel like I could write a book about it. That’s how much I have felt has gone on. Basically just a lot has changed. I have changed. But life goes on.”

Xiong’s story is not unique. He’s just next. Justin Rose was England’s darling after he tied for 4th in the 1998 Open Championship at Royal Birkdale as an amateur. He was only 17, and he turned pro the next day. He now-famously went on to miss 21 straight cuts.

“Deep down, I had the belief I was eventually going to get there,” Rose said at the 2002 Open Championship, four years later, two European Tour titles under his belt. “On the surface, I didn’t know how long it was going to take me. When you’re putting in a lot of hard work and not seeing the results, it gets very frustrating. I think deep down I never doubted the fact that I was going to eventually get where I wanted to be.”

Xiong says his game is in a good spot but he’s trying not to focus on results. He’s set on “playing the game I want to play.” If he does that, the logic says, the results will take care of themselves. So that’s the plan.

“This is obviously a big opportunity for me with the status I have, or the lack of status I have right now,” says Xiong, who plays out of TPC Summerlin in Las Vegas. “Obviously it could change a lot of things in my life. But my game feels good. Honestly the most important thing to me success-wise is just to be able to play my game and be happy out there and feel good, and I think I did that on the back nine out there today. So hopefully I can carry that to tomorrow and see where that goes.”

Casey is quick to remind Xiong could still be a senior in college right now. He enrolled in Oregon early, as a 17 year old, and then left early. At 22, he’s the same age as Wolff, a year younger than Hovland and two years younger than Morikawa.

“He’s just a pup,” Martin says. “He had to come out. I don’t think he made the wrong decision. His path, he’s going to have a story about it, and I think he’ll figure it out if he’s willing to persevere for the long haul.”

Casey says he always cheers up when talking about Xiong, whom he says has a big smile, a big heart and a phenomenal personality. And he’s being tested.

“He’s the best,” Martin says, then repeats it for good measure. “He’s the best. I’m forever linked to him. I love him so much. I’m praying for him. Just his path maybe won’t be as simple as we thought it was, but his talent hasn’t left.”

“I love that guy,” Xiong says of Casey. “We definitely have a great mutual respect, and I think that’s why I had great success in Oregon. He guided me well, but it feels like it’s a new chapter in my life, that I have to kind of go on my own. And I feel like I started it very recently. It feels good, but I have a lot left to go.”

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As GOLF.com’s managing editor, Berhow handles the day-to-day and long-term planning of one of the sport’s most-read news and service websites. He spends most of his days writing , editing, planning and wondering if he’ll ever break 80. Before joining GOLF.com in 2015, he worked at newspapers in Minnesota and Iowa. A graduate of Minnesota State University in Mankato, Minn., he resides in the Twin Cities with his wife and two kids. You can reach him at [email protected].

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Chandler Phillips, Norman Xiong share one-stroke lead at Korn Ferry Event at Ohio State

Chandler Phillips shot a 2-under-par 69 to share the lead with Norman Xiong at 6-under after the third round of Korn Ferry Tour's Nationwide Children's Hospital Championship at Ohio State on Saturday.

Xiong, who began the day two strokes behind leader Jacob Bridgeman, shot a 71.

One stroke back are Chris Petefish and Bridgeman, the leader for two rounds who shot a 74 on Saturday.

Phillips, who played at Texas A&M, has one Korn Ferry win this season to go along with one runner-up, three top-five and four top-10 finishes. He entered the tournament in 14th place on the points list.

Xiong, who played at Oregon, has one top-10 finish this season. He won one Korn Ferry event last year and entered the Nationwide Children's Hospital Championship 59th on the points list.

The Nationwide Children's Hospital Championship is one of four Korn Ferry Tour Finals events, with the top 30 players in the standings at the end of the season earning PGA Tour membership.

Davis Chatfield had the low round of the day with a 67. He is in sixth place.

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Will Smith, Dodgers agree to 10-year, $140M extension: report

Meet the 30 korn ferry tour golfers who earned pga tour cards for 2024 season.

The Korn Ferry Tour Championship was the 26th and final event of the 2023 season, and the top 30 players on the Korn Ferry Tour Points List upon conclusion of Sunday’s final round earned their PGA Tour cards for the 2024 season.

The action at Victoria National Golf Club in Newburgh, Indiana, was intense as 16 cards had already been finalized heading into the week, leaving just 14 cards still up for grabs.

Paul Barjon won the season-ending event and that vaulted him into the top 30. He was among the five players who were not in the top 30 when the week started who played their way in. Shad Tuten was dinged with a two-shot penalty Sunday and that cost him a card, dropping from 29th to 32nd. Jorge Fernandez Valdes finished in the 31st spot, a third-round 77 likely the biggest culprit for him.

The top KFT finisher was Ben Kohles, who had two wins this season.

For those who fell short, all is not lost. Players who finished Nos. 31-60 on the KFT points list have earned exemptions to the Final Stage of PGA Tour Q-School, where the top five finishers and ties will earn their 2024 PGA Tour cards.

The final stage is Dec. 14-17 at TPC Sawgrass Dye’s Valley Course as well as Sawgrass Country Club in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.

The 2024 PGA Tour season starts at The Sentry, Jan. 4-7 at the Plantation Course at Kapalua but that event is reserved for PGA Tour winners and the top 30 in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup standings from last season, so for these KFT grads, their 2024 PGA Tour season will start the next week at the Sony Open of Hawaii.

Here’s the complete list of 30 Korn Ferry Tour golfers who earned their 2024 PGA Tour cards.

Alejandro Tosti

Ben silverman, pierceson coody, grayson murray, paul barjon, max greyserman, chandler phillips, adrien dumont de chassart, david skinns, jacob bridgeman, jimmy stanger, norman xiong, nicholas lindheim, joe highsmith, patrick fishburn, mac meissner, tom whitney, kevin dougherty, chris gotterup, wilson furr, parker coody, josh teater, ryan mccormick, scott gutschewski, roger sloan, rafael campos.

Story originally appeared on GolfWeek

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Who is playing in the Texas Children's Houston Open 2024? Field and qualification explored

T he Texas Children's Houston Open 2024 is set to tee off on Thursday, March 28 at Memorial Park Golf Course in Houston. The event, taking place a couple of weeks ahead of the Masters, has some of the biggest PGA Tour stars headlining it. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler leads the stacked 138-player field.

The 14th event on the 2024 PGA Tour schedule will see a stacked field compete for a $9.1 million prize purse. The champion golfer will bag the $1.68 million paycheck along with 500 FedEx Cup points.

Apart from Scheffler, the prestigious event's field will also have big names like US Open champion Wyndham Clark and the Houston Open defending champion Tony Finau competing.

Will Zalatoris, Jason Day, Kurt Kitayama, Billy Horschel, Si Woo Kim and Jake Knapp are some other names to watch next weekend. Tiger Woods will continue his hiatus from the PGA Tour and will stay out of the competition. Players like Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas have also decided to not play next weekend.

It is pertinent to note that the Houston Open is back on the circuit schedule after a year's break.

Texas Children's Houston Open 2024 field

Here is the complete field for the Texas Children's Houston Open 2024 along with the players' eligibility criteria:

Winner of THE PLAYERS Championship (five-year exemption)

• Scottie Scheffler

Winner of PGA Championship/U.S. Open Championship (five-year exemption)

• Wyndham Clark
• Gary Woodland

Winner of World Golf Championships event (three-year exemption)

• Billy Horschel

Winner of the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday or The Genesis Invitational (three-year exemption)

• Kurt Kitayama

PGA TOUR tournament winner (two-year exemption)

• Daniel Berger
• Akshay Bhatia
• Cameron Champ
• Stewart Cink
• Nick Dunlap
• Mackenzie Hughes
• Kevin Kisner
• Taylor Moore
• Vincent Norrman
• Chez Reavie
• Davis Riley
• Adam Svensson
• Sahith Theegala
• Matt Wallace
• Will Zalatoris

Sponsor exemption (members not otherwise exempt)

• Padraig Harrington
• Jimmy Walker

Sponsor exemption (unrestricted)

• Sam Bennett
• Cole Hammer
• Ryan Palmer
• Kris Ventura

PGA Section Champion\Player of the Year

• Jesse Droemer
• Past champion
• Lanto Griffin

Top 30 in FedExCup Points List

• Scott Stallings

Top 70 in prior year's FedExCup Points List through the FedExCup Playoffs

• Patrick Rodgers
• Taylor Montgomery
• Alex Smalley
• Thomas Detry
• Stephan Jaeger
• Beau Hossler
• Hayden Buckley
• Ben Griffin
• Keith Mitchell
• Samuel Stevens
• Mark Hubbard
• Matthew NeSmith

Top 125 in prior season's FedExCup Points List through the FedExCup Fall

• Davis Thompson
• Joel Dahmen
• Tyler Duncan
• Michael Kim
• Garrick Higgo
• Robby Shelton
• Taylor Pendrith
• Callum Tarren
• Nate Lashley
• Greyson Sigg
• David Lipsky
• Justin Lower
• Carson Young
• Tyson Alexander
• Chesson Hadley
• Aaron Baddeley
• Joseph Bramlett
• Martin Laird
• Peter Malnati
• Matti Schmid
• Andrew Novak

Major Medical Extension for Houston Open

• Maverick McNealy
• Brandt Snedeker
• Jhonattan Vegas
• J.B. Holmes
• Vince Whaley

Players 2-10 from DP World Tour rankings

• Victor Perez
• Thorbjørn Olesen
• Alexander Björk
• Robert MacIntyre
• Jorge Campillo

Players 2-30 from prior year's Korn Ferry Tour Points List

• Alejandro Tosti
• Richard Hoey
• Ben Silverman
• Pierceson Coody
• Paul Barjon
• Max Greyserman
• Chandler Phillips
• Adrien Dumont de Chassart
• David Skinns
• Jacob Bridgeman
• Norman Xiong
• Nicholas Lindheim
• Joe Highsmith
• Patrick Fishburn
• McClure Meissner
• Tom Whitney
• Kevin Dougherty
• Chris Gotterup
• William Furr
• Parker Coody
• Josh Teater
• Ryan McCormick
• Scott Gutschewski
• Roger Sloan
• Rafael Campos

Top-five finishers and ties from PGA TOUR Q-School presented by Korn Ferry

• Harrison Endycott
• Trace Crowe
• Blaine Hale, Jr.
• Raul Pereda
• Hayden Springer

Top finishers from Korn Ferry Tour Medical

• Bronson Burgoon
• Erik Barnes

Reorder Category - Cat. 37 thru 44

• Patton Kizzire
• Kevin Chappell
• Martin Trainer

Nos. 126-150 on prior season's FedExCup Points List

• Henrik Norlander

More details on the Texas Children's Houston Open 2024, including prize money and tee times, will be updated soon.