With the world’s best golfers already in the area after last week’s Masters, most are making the short drive south from Augusta, Georgia, to Hilton Head, South Carolina, and Harbour Town Golf Links, one of the many Pete Dye-design tracks on Tour.
Harbour Town couldn’t be further from last week’s walk around Augusta National. It’s often described as quirky and suffocating, with narrow sightlines when standing on the tee box. Another Pete Dye design staple is the forced layups and doglegs to minimize distance and reward accuracy. But don’t think of it as binary “yes/no” accuracy in terms of fairways hit. Harbour Town requires accuracy within the fairway, as poorly positioned drives make for impossible second shots.
The poa trivialis greens are difficult to hit, not only because they’re the second-smallest on Tour but also because a lot of second shots are impacted by dangling palmetto tree limbs, even for those in the fairway. Scrambling matters because missed greens are inevitable, but it’s one of the easier places on Tour to get up and down because the course is so flat, and the small greens make for fewer 50+ feet lag putt opportunities.
This is the second year in a row that Harbour Town gets signature event status, so the field looks quite different from your standard RBC Heritage historically. This is a small-field, no-cut event, with 68 players in the field after Hideki Matsuyama and Viktor Hovland’s withdrawals. As of this writing, world-beater Scottie Scheffler remains in the field post-Masters triumph, though no one would be surprised if he skipped it given the fact that “Baby Scheff” is on the way any day. Sam Burns and his wife are also expecting, and he’s a possible late scratch as well, so proceed with caution.
This setup brings more golfers into play, with most winners coming from down the board here. Signature Event fields certainly change the calculus a bit with that trend, but it’s something to note.
For more course details, check out Ron’s course preview. It’s the best in the business, bar none. Here’s an important tidbit about Harbour Town:
Characterized by numerous doglegs, overhanging trees, a wide array of devilish bunkers, and minuscule greens, Harbour Town Golf Links is a coastal par-71 course that measures 7,191 yards.
There are numerous reasons the course has averaged over par since 2016. With trees being everywhere, drives off-the-tee that are not hit to the proper location on the fairway could be met with hanging branches on the following approach shot. Water comes into play on nine holes, with six of those affecting approach shots. Also, the second-smallest greens on Tour combined with a course that is exposed to the wind from the Atlantic coast can cause GIR% numbers to shrink rapidly on blustery days.
Players will need to be creative and ready to hit a variety of differing-shaped shots into the greens. Harbour Town is the ninth toughest course to gain strokes on approach and the fifth toughest to gain on shots from greater than 150 yards. With 48% of approaches coming between 150-200 yards, this week will be a true test of iron play.
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f684b2f3d4218ee06dad551b3bb2074bNoonan’s RBC Heritage Betting Targets
Cameron Young
Cameron Young is off to a tremendous start to the year, but he continues to stall out just short of the winner’s circle. Young’s made ten starts in 2024, finishing T4 or better in three of them, and comes in on the back of a T9 at last week’s Masters.
His ball-striking has been excellent all season, ranking fifth in SG: BS in 2024. He’s gaining almost a full stroke per round on approach and is up nearly a half-stroke per round versus his 2023 rates. The driver remains a weapon, but he’s actually performed quite well on tracks where he’s forced to club down a bit. His distance is still an advantage in these scenarios, and that’s evident in the data. Over the past 50 rounds on courses where less-than-driver use is heavy off the tee, Young ranks eighth in SG: BS among this loaded field. In the key proximity range this week, 175-200 yards in, Young is second in overall proximity.
He’s gained strokes putting in back-to-back starts and five of his past seven starts, and if he can manage a field-average performance on these greens, he should be in contention come Sunday. He was one of many T3 finishers back in 2022, one shot short of the playoff between Jordan Spieth and Patrick Cantlay.
Si Woo Kim
Somewhere over the past year or so, Si Woo Kim has become incredibly consistent, which is a far cry from how I would’ve described him 18 months ago. He’s made the cut in all ten starts in 2024, finishing T30 or better in seven of them, with his best finish coming at The PLAYERS (6th), another Pete Dye design, just a few weeks ago.
Kim’s T30 at last week’s Masters was the first time he hasn’t gained strokes on approach this season. Despite his lack of distance, Si Woo gained strokes off the tee again last week, something that he’s done in every start this season. He hit 49 out of 56 fairways last week, which led the field, and while accuracy alone isn’t enough to get it done here, Si Woo is at his best in spots like these, where positional golf is the name of the game.
Shane Lowry
Shane Lowry’s game is perfectly suited for courses like Harbour Town and his form prime as well. Lowry ranks third in this week’s field in SG: APP this season, gaining 0.88 strokes per round. He’s up nearly double on his 2023 mark, and he’s really leaned into the off-the-tee precision, becoming one of the more accurate off-the-tee players on the PGA Tour.
Lowry ranks fourth in my model this week, thriving on SG: BS (less-than-driver) and SG: APP on courses with small greens. He’s also fared well on corollary courses, including a T3 finish here in 2022 with Cam Young and Cam Davis. Lowry was a late addition to the field via a sponsor exemption, which led to a discount on his initial price.
Cameron Davis
Cam Davis has teed it up at Harbour Town three times, and it’s clear that he likes this track. A T25 in his debut was his lone finish outside the top 10, with a T7 last season and the aforementioned T3 with Young and Lowry back in 2022.
Like Young, Davis’s length off the tee would lead you off of him this week, but some of his best finishes on Tour have come at Colonial, Sedgefield, Sawgrass, and Harbour Town. He carried his T21 finish in Houston into his second appearance at the Masters, where he was inside the top 10 all week until a late bogey knocked him down to T12, which is still good enough to bring him back next year. Davis is streaky, but let’s ride the wave.
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