After ‘Bittersweet' Run of Runner-Ups, Scottie Scheffler Hopes for One Better at PGA Championship

The world No. 1 is looking for his first win since January in his PGA Championship title defense.

Scottie Scheffler is hoping to become the third player in the modern era to win back-to-back PGA Championships. | Bill Streicher-Imagn Images

Even those trying to take Scottie Scheffler down can marvel at his greatness.

“I think it is, it’s his relentlessness,” Rory McIlroy said Tuesday at the PGA Championship when asked what part of Scheffler’s game he admires the most. “The comfort in which he does the same things over and over. It’s the little—it’s not flashy, but he dots his ‘I’s and crosses his ‘T’s and does all the right things.”

Recently, Scheffler has been doing the same thing over and over—but it’s not winning.

It’s finishing second.

For Scheffler’s standards, that’s a letdown. Even though, in a way, it’s historic.

“I think it was last week my wife was like, ‘Hey, Scottie, you’re like the first guy in PGA Tour history to have three solo runner-ups in a row,’” Scheffler said Tuesday at Aronimink Golf Club. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, it’s probably because the guy that was playing that good figured out a way to win one of those, he didn’t come second in all three.’”

The world No. 1 finished one back of Rory McIlroy at the Masters. The following week, he lost to Matt Fitzpatrick in a playoff at the RBC Heritage. Two weeks later, in his last start before his PGA Championship title defense, Scheffler again was solo second at the Cadillac Championship, although he finished six strokes back of Cam Young. It wasn’t as if he stumbled down the stretch, though. Instead, he fell short because of a lackluster early round.

"For me to have a chance to win the PGA Championship, it is quite literally a lifetime of work and sacrifice."

Scottie Scheffler doesn't take his place on the Wanamaker Trophy lightly.

The 2025 champion reflects on what his third major championship win means. pic.twitter.com/xYNV1uK7y4

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 12, 2026

“A little bit of it is bittersweet,” Scheffler said. “Finishing second in a golf tournament is not bad, but I mean—especially in the way I did it in a couple of them. I was spotting guys so many strokes going into the weekend, mainly the Masters. Didn’t have a very good chance going into the weekend there. [The RBC Heritage], didn’t have a very good chance going into the weekend there. Cadillac, I finished solo second, but really didn’t have—didn’t really have that good of a chance. So just different things.

“Overall, yeah, I’d say a little bit bittersweet.”

Despite not having won since his first start of the season at the American Express, Scheffler is still having a good year, to say the least. He has six top 5s in nine starts, with his worst result a T24. He’s also first on Tour in strokes-gained total and top 5 in every strokes-gained category except approach (42nd).  

“You know you’re playing good golf, and you’d love to get some wins,” Scheffler said. “Finishing second hurts, but I think when you reflect and you’re looking at things to work on, there’s a lot less to clean up when you’re finishing second than there is when you’re finishing 30th.”

So perhaps Scheffler’s due? He’s always working to get better, even when it seems like he can’t go any higher.

“I’ve always loved that part of the journey,” he said. “For me, getting better at golf is such an interesting and fun thing to try to accomplish. You’re always toeing the line between getting better and getting worse. When I can go out by myself and practice and have something that I want to work on and improve on, that’s one of my favorite things. I love trying to figure things out. That’s always been what’s driven me.”

Maybe that relentlessness to avoid the status quo will propel Scheffler toward becoming the third player, alongside Tiger Woods and Brooks Koepka, to win back-to-back PGAs in the stroke play era.

That’s worth marveling at.