Tiger Woods to play alongside Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas at Riviera
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Written by Staff
Tiger Woods will tee off with two familiar faces in his return to the PGA TOUR.
The 82-time TOUR winner will play alongside Justin Thomas and Rory McIlroy in the first two rounds of The Genesis Invitational at The Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades, California. They will tee off at 3:04 p.m. ET Thursday and 10:24 a.m. ET in Friday’s second round.
Woods serves as host of this week’s event at the venue where he made his PGA TOUR debut as a 16-year-old in 1992. The Genesis will be Woods’ first official start since The Open in July and his first start in a non-major since the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP at nearby Sherwood Country Club in late 2020.
The threesome owns a combined six FedExCups after Rory McIlroy earned an unprecedented third last year. Woods is the only other multiple winner of the FedExCup (2007, ’09), while Thomas claimed the season-long title in 2017.
The three are all friends in south Florida and competed alongside each other when Woods played a pair of unofficial events in December. Thomas and Jordan Spieth defeated Woods and McIlroy in the latest edition of Capital One’s The Match, while Woods and his son Charlie played with Thomas and his father Mike in both rounds of the PNC Championship. They were the final twosome in the PNC’s final round after Team Thomas shot a first-round 57 and the Woodses were in second, two shots back. Vijay Singh and son Qass went on to win the event by two.
The Woods and Thomas families have become especially close, with Tiger calling Justin “the little brother that I never had.”
Riviera is the course that Woods has played the most on TOUR without a victory, but it still has played a significant role as the place where his PGA TOUR career began. He shot 72-75 here in 1992 after receiving a sponsor exemption into the field.
“It was a life-changing moment for me,” Woods said.
This will be Woods’ first time competing in the Genesis in three years. He also played with Thomas and McIlroy in the opening two rounds at Riviera in 2018 and 2019.