The PGA Tour heads to Texas next week for the Texas Children’s Houston Open. But before players head west, they are looking to capture the final event in the Florida swing at the Valspar Championship. Not all of the Tour’s top stars are in the field, but Xander Schauffele and Viktor Hovland, both in search of their game, are.
On Friday, the pair of PGA Tour stars played some exceptional golf, with Hovland particularly skying up the leaderboard.
The Norwegian pro carded a second-round 4-under 67 to move to 5-under for the tournament. That has him sitting tied for third with less than half of the field still on the course.
Hovland has watched his game fall apart ever since he won the 2023 Tour Championship. His 2024 season was a thing to forget, and thus far, 2025 has been just as bad.
But the six-time PGA Tour winner recently reconnected with Grant Waite, who is helping him try to regain his form.
“Yeah, I mean, he’s [Waite] really smart,” Hovland said after his round.
“I think I have a little bit of a different perspective now going through a lot of struggles the last year since we worked together, and he has a lot of knowledge and there’s a lot of information and I don’t think I was quite ready for it a year ago.”
Whatever tweaks he made to his game last year, they did not work.
He finished the season winless and garnered only two top 10s in 16 PGA Tour events. Furthermore, he missed the cut in three of the four majors. He did, however, earn a solo third at the PGA Championship, showing the talent is still there.
But Hovland is not getting ahead of himself at the Valspar Championship.
“Very happy with obviously the result and the leaderboard,” he said.
“I still feel like I am kind of getting max out of my game right now. So not to put myself down, but for it to be sustainable at that level I need to strike it a bit better and it needs to be a bit more predictable.”
Xander Schauffele Showing Signs of Life
The World No. 3, Xander Schauffele, entered the Valspar Championship also looking for improvement.
Since the rib injury that kept him out of action for almost two months, the California native has played two events. He finished tied for 40th at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and followed that up with a 72nd-place finish at The PLAYERS.
Yes, he managed to keep his made-cut streak alive. That now stands at 59 consecutive cuts made, the longest streak since Tiger Woods during his prime.
But his play on the weekend left plenty to be desired. He will look to rectify that this weekend as he made a charge up the Valspar leaderboard Friday.
With five holes to play during his second round, Schauffele is tied for seventh at 4-under par. If he continues striking the ball as well as he has this week, he is staring at his best finish of the season.
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