Ben Griffin joins Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy in rare air Sunday
Scottie Scheffler isn't anywhere close to the PGA Tour right now, and he won't be for another few months. He did his damage during the main championship season. And Ben Griffin is thankful for it.
Griffin notched his third PGA Tour win in 2025 Sunday, shooting a lights-out 63 at El Cardonal at Diamante, just a day after joking, "I learned that Scottie wouldn't be in the field in Cabo, so I felt I had a chance."
The Scheffler quip isn't misplaced, as cheeky as it may be. The last time they teed it up together, it was Scheffler winning the Procore Championship in Napa. Griffin finished solo second. Three months earlier, the tangoed at the Memorial, where Scheffler took first. Griffin, again, finished solo second.
He did get the better of him a week before the Memorial, where Griffin won for the first time as an individual. (Scheffler finished T4). Griffin's first Tour victory came at the Zurich Classic, a team event where he paired up with Andrew Novak. This win will now push him into the top 10 in the world ranking for the first time in his life, something even his biggest supporters would have scoffed at just a few years ago.
No, Memorial co-leader Ben Griffin is not surprised to be here
Griffin's recent rise has been covered well, given that he quit the professional ranks to become a mortgage loan officer in the early 2020s, after playing his college golf at North Carolina. It was only early 2023 when he began to play at a PGA Tour-average level, and he remained there for the last few years until 2025 when he leveled up in a way no one could have expected. Sunday's win is his 11th worldwide top 10 finish this calendar year.
He's become an elite putter – despite using a new putter this week! – as well as a top-level ball-striker. It showed on Sunday, where he birdied every par 3 at El Cardonal, and even got a little emotional when talking about it post-round with Golf Channel's Kira Dixon.
"My dad always calls me Mr. Par-3," Griffin said when it became official, a bit of a pause in his throat.
His wife, Dana, stood next to him during the interview. They're set to get married in a few weeks, and she was getting just as emotional as her fiancé, a reminder that even a third win during a Fall Series event brings its own set of stakes with it.
"Three wins and getting married in the same year," Griffin said to close the interview, "it's hard to beat."
We'll agree with that. The third win helped Griffin join Scheffler and Rory McIlroy as the only players to win three PGA Tour events this calendar year.
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