Olympics with a short field delivers stars on the podium and compelling golf

Lydia Ko, of New Zealand, poses for the cameras with her gold medal following final round of the women’s golf event at the Olympics

Take a small field and eliminate about half of them for not having a realistic chance of winning and it sounds like it could be a LIV Golf event.

But this is the Olympics, with 60 players from more than 30 countries, some of whom rarely experience a big stage, none getting paid. Singapore had its first player (Shannon Tan) in the women’s competition. Switzerland had its first (Joel Girrbach) in the men’s event.

That might explain why golf in the Olympics continues to deliver the biggest stars on the podium, along with compelling stories.

Paris was no exception.

Scottie Scheffler set the tone for the fortnight at Le Golf National with a Sunday charge that was as amazing as the collapse of Jon Rahm.

Scheffler was four shots behind going into the last round, and the world’s No. 1 player still trailed by six shots as he played the 12th hole. He shot 29 on the back nine, closed with a 9-under 62 and added Olympic gold to an already astonishing year.

Xander Schauffele, the gold medalist from the Tokyo Games, also is having a monster year with major titles at the PGA Championship and British Open. He shared the 54-hole lead with Rahm and said afterward that “cherry on top would not do it justice” if he had won another gold.

“Scottie is going to have about 14 cherries on top of his cake,” Schauffele said.

It’s been that kind of year.

The best year in women’s golf belongs to Nelly Korda, with five straight wins (including a major) and six titles in seven starts. The Olympics, however, were all about Lydia Ko of New Zealand.

Ko had said at the start of the week she hasn’t seen her silver medal from Rio de Janeiro or her bronze from Tokyo since winning them. Her father had the silver. Her sister had taken the bronze back to their parents’ native South Korea to share with family. Ko said if she won the gold, she would have to take back the other medals.

Ko’s road back to her Florida home probably will include a detour to South Korea. “I think I need to find a good place to put them all together,” she said yesterday [Macau time].

Her game was as good as it has been all year, and the timing could not have been better. Ko, who got married at the end of 2023, has been contemplating retirement and concluded this would be her last Olympics. She needed one more victory to get into the LPGA Hall of Fame.

Just like the men’s competition, there was a combination of clutch play (Ko) and collapses (Korda, Morgane Metraux, Miyu Yamashita, Rose Zhang). Ko made a 45-foot birdie putt on the seventh hole, built a five-shot lead and then had to hang on to win by two.

She headed to Scotland and didn’t get her first good sleep until Sunday night.

“I woke up like, ‘Was that a dream? Did that just really happen?’ Super exciting,” she said at the Women’s Scottish Open. “Just very grateful for literally this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Indeed, it was a quite a show.

But that’s how it was the previous two Olympics for golf.

Korda won the gold in Tokyo as the newly minted No. 1 player in women’s golf who was coming off her first major. Schauffele won gold with a 5-foot par putt on the last hole, a tribute to both parents. His mother was raised in Japan — his grandparents are still there — and his father had Olympic aspirations of his own until getting struck by a drunk driver on his way to a German training site. He lost an eye among numerous injuries. Storybook stuff.

In Rio de Janeiro, former U.S. Open champion Justin Rose won a duel with British Open champion Henrik Stenson.

The more compelling outcome was Inbee Park. She has been injured in 2016 and barely played while she tried to recover, and there was a push behind the scenes by the South Korean squad to replace her with someone who would have had a better shot at gold. Park ignored the noise, and then took down Ko — the No. 1 player at the time — to win.

Golf already has produced gold medalists destined for the Hall of Fame if they aren’t there already, such as Park and Ko. Scheffler is virtually assured of being No. 1 for the longest stretch since Tiger Woods. Rose is a former No. 1. Schauffele is a double major winner who finally is getting is due as one of the elite.

By now there should be little debate whether golf belongs in the Olympics, even though it doesn’t look like other sports in the program. There is no getting around the fact most Olympic athletes wait four years for their prize and golf has four of them (five on the LPGA Tour) a year in the form of majors.

Scheffler’s year would not have been incomplete without a gold medal. He has a green jacket. Ko’s career was made complete with gold.

Next up are the Los Angeles Games in 2028. Given how the last three Olympiads have gone, what will Riviera deliver? DOUG FERGUSON, SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, MDT/AP