9-Hole Scoring Record on PGA Tour
The 9-hole scoring record refers to the lowest score ever recorded on either the front nine or the back nine during a PGA Tour tournament round. (The front nine refers to Holes 1-9, the back nine to Holes 10-18.) The golfer who holds the record is a U.S. Open champion who was 46 years old at the time he set the mark.
PGA Tour's 9-Hole Record: 26 Strokes by Corey Pavin
Corey Pavin, winner of the 1995 U.S. Open and a 15-time PGA Tour victor, holds the PGA Tour's 9-hole scoring record with a 26. He recorded that score on the front nine of his first round in the 2006 U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee. That was 8-under par on the par-34 nine.At the time Pavin became the first-ever PGA Tour player to shoot 26 over a single nine, only four golfers in tour history had recorded a 27. Since then, many others have achieved a 27 for one nine, but nobody else has yet matched Pavin's 26.
"It seemed like it was a misprint up there, maybe," Pavin said after he completed the round. "It was just one of those nine holes, once in a lifetime for me so far, anyway."
Pavin, who was 46 years old at the time, birdied the first six holes, parred No. 7, then added two more birdies on Nos. 8 and 9. He finished the round with a score of 61. It was an unexpected score from Pavin at that time: He didn't have any Top 10 finishes in the 2006 season preceding the U.S. Bank Championship (better remembered as the Greater Milwaukee Open) and had as many missed cuts as made.
That opening 26, however, gave Pavin the momentum he needed to record his final PGA Tour victory. He won the 2006 U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee at 20-under 260, beating runner-up Jerry Kelly by two strokes.
9-Hole Scores of 27 on the PGA Tour
More than a dozen golfers have now recorded a 27 over the front nine or back nine of a PGA Tour tournament round. But Mike Souchak was the first golfer to do so. Souchak had a 27 on the back nine during the first round of his victory in the 1955 Texas Open.It was 20 years before the next 27, recorded by Andy North in the 1975 B.C. Open. And those were the only two 27s for nine holes seen on the PGA Tour prior to the 2000s.
Jim Furyk scored 27 for nine holes in the 2016 Travelers Championship, which was part of the first round of 58 in PGA Tour history. And Brandt Snedeker has two nines of 27: at the 2007 Buick Invitational, and during the 2018 Wyndham Championship. Snedeker is the only golfer with multiple 27s.
In addition to Pavin, Souchak, North, Furyk and Snedeker, there have also been 9-hole 27s on the PGA Tour by Billy Mayfair, Robert Gamez, Chris Riley, Nick Watney, Paul Casey, Sergio Garcia, Ryan Palmer, Dustin Johnson and Tom Kim.
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