Winner's bag: Maverick McNealy collects first TOUR win after ball switch at The RSM Classic

Maverick McNealy birdied the final hole at The RSM Classic in emphatic fashion to take home his first victory on the PGA TOUR in his 142nd start. He did so off the back of a golf ball change heading into the week at Sea Island Golf Club, the final event of the FedExCup Fall.

After already securing his PGA TOUR playing privileges for 2025 and comfortably inside the Aon Next 10, with starts set at two Signature Events at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and The Genesis Invitational, McNealy took the final opportunity of the season to debut the new 2025 Titleist Pro V1. The decision proved to be a fruitful one for McNealy, outlasting a bunched leaderboard with a final round 2-under 68 to win by one shot over amateur Luke Clanton, a resurgent Daniel Berger and Nico Echavarria – who also collected a FedExCup Fall victory with the new 2025 Pro V1x at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP.

"I said once I locked up top 60, I would switch balls," McNealy said after his victory. "Obviously, Bermuda we didn't have the ball shipped over there, so I didn't have access to it. I said I'll play it in Sea Island, see how it does under the gun. Then in the wind on Thursday, it performed unbelievably well. I was really excited, every ball came out exactly how I wanted to, held the wind, went through the wind and that gave me a ton of confidence."

McNealy first tried the 2025 edition at his home event in Las Vegas at the Shriners Children's Open, the same tournament where Titleist first launched the original Pro V1 in October 2000. After more testing at home through the fall, the new golf ball got the call-up for The RSM Classic. It wasn’t the first ball switch this season for McNealy, who had previously changed from the ‘23 Pro V1x to the ‘23 Pro V1 at this year’s PGA Championship.

With the new ball in play, McNealy led the field on the Seaside Course in Strokes Gained: Total, was second in Proximity on Approach and fourth in Strokes Gained: Tee To Green. (Shotlink is not used on the Plantation Course.) He also finished T2 for Greens in Regulation for the whole week.

Another switch McNealy made recently was into the new TaylorMade P7CBs after playing the P7TWs for most of the season. His decision to switch from the Tiger Woods-designed blades to the more forgiving cavity back irons came at the first event of the FedExCup Fall at the Procore Championship, resulting in the ability for McNealy to hit better-flighted irons. This helped him on his way to victory where earlier in the week wind gusts reached up to 30 mph in the Golden Isles.

"Globally in my golf swing, my swing direction was way right and so everything was a big draw," McNealy said. "I couldn't hit any flighted shots because if you hit down, it creates more path to the right, so it was just a mess. So I realized I had to swing left and hit more down and those irons compared to the blades I was using, they have more bounce and they kind of – if I swung the way I was swinging before, I hit them all thin, so I had to feel like I was smacking down on them. Mike Taylor, who built all my irons through college, he says that the tools train the player. So this was kind of a preemptive tweak to have my equipment help me make the changes that I want to make in my golf swing."

Check out below McNealy’s full bag that he used for his first PGA TOUR victory:

Driver: TaylorMade Qi10 (10.5 degrees)
Shaft: Graphite Design Tour AD XC 6 TX

3-wood: TaylorMade Stealth 2 (16.5 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 7 X

7-wood: TaylorMade Stealth 2 (21 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Red 8 X

Irons: TaylorMade P7CB (4-9)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100

Wedges: Titleist Vokey Design SM10 (46-10F, 50-08F, 54-08M), Vokey Design WedgeWorks (58-L @59)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 (46), True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 (50-58)

Putter: Odyssey Toulon Design Prototype

Grips: Golf Pride MCC

Ball: Titleist Pro V1x