At the Ryder Cup in recent years, it seems the US team can’t catch a break. At the Presidents’ Cup, on the other hand, the Americans seem incapable of doing anything wrong.
The evidence can be found in the record books. The Europeans have beaten the United States in six of the last eight Ryder Cups. Flash back to 2022, and the American team’s Ryder Cup record drops to 3-9. They have lost the last two in a row, including one embarrassing defeat last September to Bethpage Black.
Meanwhile, the United States team dominated the Presidents Cup all the time, earning an overall record of 13-1-1, including 10 straight wins dating back to 2005. It is the same year 2026, the rookie of the Presidents Cup of the United States was born Jackson Koivun.
But on Tuesday in Medina, US Presidents Cup captain Brandt Snedeker revealed a way in which this year’s Presidents’ Cup it is “eerily similar” to last year’s disaster at Bethpage Black: the setting of the course.
In doing so, Snedeker provided American fans with reason to worry that the US team’s long winning streak may be at risk.
Brandt Snedeker says Presidents Cup course setup ‘didn’t go according to plan’
At the 2025 Ryder Cup, the US team was beaten by the Europeans in the first two days of the three-day competition. One of the biggest culprits was the course setup.
At the Ryder Cup and the Presidents Cup, the captain of the home team will choose how the course will be prepared by the maintenance team. By setting up to play to his team’s strengths, the home captain can give his team a huge advantage.
But at Bethpage, the course setup went wrong on the US team. One of the mistakes could be blamed on captain Keegan Bradley. He decided to have the greens crew take down Bethpage’s notoriously long rough, hoping it would help his team. The opposite happened. This decision ended up benefiting the European players much more, and Bradley later admitted that “it was obviously not the right decision”.
However, there was another course condition problem for the American team last fall in Long Island, one Bradley had no control over: the weather.
Rainstorms softened and slowed the Black Course greens considerably during Ryder Cup week, take away another advantage for the Americanswhich generally perform better on hard and fast surfaces.
Unfortunately, that second issue followed the US team across the country to Chicago, where Snedeker and his team’s course setup plan was thwarted by heavy rains that softened. The No. 3 course of Medinahmaking it play very differently than I wanted.
“As a home captain, this is one of the advantages. You can set parameters with how the golf course should be set up,” Snedeker explained in his press conference on Tuesday. “I’ve been very clear with our Tour staff about how we want this place to try to get there, kind of strangely similar to what happened in Bethpage, it didn’t go according to plan.”
Earlier in his press conference, Snedeker explained how the recent rains changed the course of the Presidents Cup hosts.
“I think it will be really difficult to see how difficult this place is with the conditions we have. It takes a drastic drought to see this place reach the design intent. The intent of this design was to have a ball run in the fairways, in the greens, bouncing around and let these slopes do their thing,” said Snedeker. “With the amount of rain we’ve had the last ten days, it’s going to be really hard for this golf course to dry out. It’s going to be a really tough week’s barometer of how difficult this golf course can play.”
He continued: “I’m sure the Tour staff will do everything they can to make sure this golf course dries out. They’ve done a phenomenal job in the 48 hours we’ve been here trying to dry this place out, but there’s only so much you can do.”
Snedeker and his vice captains made their course setup plan based on how they expected Medinah to play under normal conditions. But the weather changed everything, taking a distinct advantage for the Americans.
“So you can have a great plan in front of you, but Mother Nature puts a wrench in it, and there are other factors that you have to deal with,” Snedeker said.
Ultimately, he argued, it’s up to the players to perform, no matter the conditions.
“Try to do everything you can to stack the odds in your favor,” Snedeker continued. “But at the end of the day, guys have to go out there and do it.
Oh, and there’s another major disadvantage that Team USA faces this week related to the home course. Is it it recently underwent a major two-year renovation. One of the men in charge of that job? Geoff Ogilvythe captain of this year’s International team.
