Rory McIlroy explains how Scottie Scheffler propelled him to Pebble Beach glory

Like the rest of the golfing world, Rory McIlroy has followed Scottie Scheffler rather closely.

It’s hard not to, especially after his historic 2024 season, in which Scheffler won nine times overall. One of those victories came at Augusta National, the one place that has prevented McIlroy from winning the career grand slam. Maybe McIlroy can overcome those demons this April.

To do so, McIlroy must limit his mistakes, play more conservatively, and ensure his short game is consistent — three aspects that helped him win this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. He played near flawless golf on Sunday, waltzing around one of golf’s cathedrals with a 6-under 66 to win the 27th title of his PGA Tour career. Yet, McIlroy knew when he could be aggressive, as evidenced by his jaw-dropping tee shot on the 571-yard 14th hole. McIlroy hit a bomb over the eucalyptus trees on the corner and had only a 7-iron in. He went on to make an eagle and ultimately finished two shots ahead of Shane Lowry, who, like McIlroy, made a hole-in-one during Thursday’s first round.

McIlroy also finished six ahead of Scheffler but spoke highly of the World No. 1 after his round. He explained how he has taken pages from Scheffler’s textbook, hoping to emulate his game and produce historic results, too.

“I’m a big admirer of Scottie for a lot of different reasons, but every time I play with him and I watch how he plays and how disciplined he is, it’s a really cool thing to watch,” McIlroy said.

“It’s strategy and picking more conservative targets at times, and maybe picking more conservative clubs off tees. Then I think the big thing is obviously my short game as well. My short game last year was a little up and down. I would have a good week, then I’d have a bad week. There wasn’t a ton of consistency in it. The up-and-down on 1, for example, today, it’s a big up-and-down just to get things going. The up-and-down on 4, same sort of thing.”

When looking at the stats, McIlroy’s short game does not jump off the page in a bad way per se. He ranked 59th in strokes gained putting and got up and down 64 percent of the time, good for 17th on tour. But his tribulations on the greens at the U.S. Open and his failure to convert numerous birdie opportunities throughout the season immediately come to mind. McIlroy’s right. His short game has to become more reliable if he wants to become the best player in the world and break his now 11-year-long major championship drought.

“This is just really about trying to get the best out of myself. That’s really it,” McIlroy said.

“I know if I can play to my capabilities and do what I did out there [on Sunday at Pebble Beach] a little bit more, the world rankings or the wins or whatever will really take care of themselves. Scottie is and has been the best player in our game for the last couple of years. I feel like I’ve been close but just not quite there. But that’s motivating, that’s motivating to try to get the best out of myself and yeah, try to become the best player in the world again.”

So how does McIlroy get the best out of himself going forward?

“Just doing the right things, doing the right things every day, being consistent, being disciplined, getting enough sleep, eating the right diet, doing the right amount of practice, recovering, making time for other interests in my life that can get me away from golf a little bit, too,” McIlroy explained further.

“I think just all of that combined. Purely from a golf perspective, just doing the little things right each and every day, then that adds up to some cool stuff.”

Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Follow him on X @jack_milko.