American captain Nathan Smith didn’t know it at the time, but he predicted what was to come Sunday night at the 51st Walker Cup.
“This is one of the biggest sporting events in the world, and we’re going to find out why this afternoon,” Smith said after the Americans swept the morning foursomes session to take a 9.5-6.5 lead in Lahinch.
need just 3.5 points to retain the cup and 4 to win, the Americans were on the verge of a sixth consecutive Walker Cup victory. After all, GB&I had only mounted two Sunday singles comebacks in Walker Cup history, and neither of those teams faced a mountain as big as the one the 2026 team faced.
But the beauty of sports is that anything can happen. It’s one of the only truly unscripted things left in a world ruled by social media, influencers and a flood of reality shows.
So, as the 10 singles matches landed at Lahinch on Sunday afternoon, GB&I believed they could pull off their own version of Team Europe’s Ryder Cup ‘Miracle at Medinah’ comeback in 2012. They won the first four matches to take the lead, grab momentum and get the Irish crowd behind them. But then, after USA’s Ryder Cowan and Josiah Gilbert won their matches, GB&I needed everything to go their way to complete a historic comeback. If a domino did not fall, a sixth consecutive loss was certain.
American Kihei Akina needed to miss a short birdie putt on 18. He did. GB&I’s Niall Sheils Donegan had to follow up with a par putt of his own to halve the match. Check it out. GB&I’s Eliot Baker was to become just the second player ever to beat Stewart Hagestad in Walker Cup singles – and he did so with a birdie on 18. The home team needed Miles Russell to three-putt from 50 feet on 17, miss a 15-foot par putt on 18 and have Connor Graham make a six-foot match on the 18th birdie. Done, done and. . . done
Even after all that, GB&I still need Josh Hill, the shortest player on either team, to beat the World No. 2 amateur Tyler Watts in 18 to win the Cup. Watts missed his tee shot left and had to tee off. He left his third shot 20 feet from the cup for birdie. Hill putt his second into the greenside bunker and played a magnificent long bunker shot to 5 feet. When Watts’ birdie attempt missed, Hill put the exclamation point on a historic victory rolling in his birdie putt.
Smith was right: the Walker Cup is really one of the biggest sporting events in the world and, like my colleague Michael Bamberger wrotemade its case as the best team event in golf. All that was on display at Lahinch. The secret sauce of the Walker Cup is that it does not worry about crowds and infrastructure and allows the event to go to places like Lahinch or, last year, Cypress Point. It is a pure event for diehard golf fans, one that is imbued with the DNA of what golf was originally meant to be before billions of dollars and television broadcasts and commercial interests began to mold pro golf into something different.
The Walker Cup is match-play golf in its purest form, with limited crowds – 8,000 were on hand per day at Lahinch – in some of the world’s great gems.
Sunday was the Walker Cup at its best. It was great drama and ended with the Americans suffering a devastating collapse as the Irish crowd in attendance left. Even that showed what makes the Walker Cup different. Historic losses in sports often lead to tears and anger and sadness. The negative emotions that our current social media scrolling society seems to lap up.
But as Smith and a team of young American stars digested a loss that was unthinkable hours before, there was nothing of the sort. For the United States, there was no one to take the blame or ruin a heartbreak that they will live with for the rest of their lives. They were sad, yes. How could they not be? But when asked about their fresh scar, Smith, Cowan and Hagestad all draw on a different emotion, one that speaks to how meaningful this event is, both to them and to the game.
Gratitude.
“Sucks. Sucks losing, but at the end of the day, someone’s going to lose,” Cowan said. “What we can take from this is what means the most. Just being around all these guys, being around Stew, it’s a blessing. It really is. We had a great week. No matter where we finished, we had a great week, and I feel like we all grew together as a team.”
The 35-year-old Hagestad, who was a member of five previous winning teams, echoed the sentiment. The loss will sting. But bigger things remain after the wound is healed.
“Sucks. Sucks now, but sport, right?” Hagestad said. “That’s why we do it. That’s why every one of us practices. That’s why we try to put ourselves in situations to be a part of things like this. It literally came down to the last match. It’s an honor to be a part of it. It’s an honor to be in the Walker Cup Society. As much as I’m sorry for myself and our golf team, they played the USGA and our amateur team and they played the whole game. great.”
With GB&I celebrating what Luke Poulter deemed the ‘Legend of Lahinch’, Smith and Hagestad looked at a team of budding young stars with bright futures – a group of players who are expected to go on to do great things – and delivered a message about this week and this event and what will ultimately be the lasting memory of something that hurts now, but one day will turn into a postiive. Such is the nature of the Walker Cup.
“I think this is one of those things where, as they get older, they’re going to appreciate it more and more,” Hagestad said. “So, at this point, I’m really excited for them, and as they look back, I’m sure they’re going to have a lot of really good memories. It sucks in the moment now, but at the same time, this is one of those things that ages really, really well. It’s just an incredible community, and we’re really, really lucky to be a part of older, like … and we’re all going to have a really neat bond.”
“I told them how proud I was of them,” said Smith, the U.S. captain. “He played their hearts out. It’s a big journey. It’s a hard journey. Everything that, as a team, tried to overcome. Just tell them that I love them. Everything they need in this life, they have it from me.”
As Smith predicted, Sunday afternoon at Lahinch showed why the Walker Cup is “one of the biggest sporting events”.
The one that provides pure drama and in the end is about something much bigger than the final result.
