Scottie's slam search, women take on Riviera and a summer of Philadelphia freedom: Golf events to circle on your calendar for 2026

Remember when the bowl games on January 1 put a period on the end of the college football season? Or when the Super Bowl was always played in January? Or the pro golf year started with those gorgeous views of Kapalua and the Maui coastline?

The sports calendar has changed dramatically over the past decade, but 2026 seems even more topsy-turvy. The College Football Playoffs won’t be over until Jan. 19, the Super Bowl will be played on Feb. 8, and for the first time in decades, the PGA Tour won’t tee off until the middle of January.

The reason for the latter is unfortunate: water supply issues at Kapalua forced the cancellation of The Sentry, the season’s first $20 million signature event. And so the season begins on Jan. 15 at the Sony Open in Hawaii at venerable Waialae C.C. It seems a rather fitting start, though, given how much, considering the rumor mill, the tour’s schedule could change by next January.

The bumpy start aside, 2026 figures to offer an enormously compelling golf season, with Scottie Scheffler not showing signs of letting up, major championships featuring some of the game’s most storied venues, three top-level international team competitions, and the lingering questions about what the PGA Tour will look like in 2027 and beyond.

For your consideration, here is a look at some the most important dates of the golf year:

HGV Tournament of Champions, Lake Nona C.C., Orlando (Jan. 29-Feb. 1)

The LPGA starts it season after an extraordinary ’25 campaign in which there were 29 different winners on the tour. The woman who won three times, World No. 1 Jeeno Thitkul, naturally dominated and remains the most formidable player on tour. The other lead storyline: When will Nelly Korda win after being skunked in this year? Heading into the HGV, she will be standing on 21 consecutive official starts without lifting a trophy. This is no "slump"—the World No. 2 had nine top-10s this season—but when you win as much as Korda does, this drought is still a head-scratcher.

LIV Golf opener, Riyadh G.C., Saudi Arabia (Feb. 4-7)

Charles Laberge/LIV Golf

LIV begins its fourth season with the entire tournament under the lights in Saudi Arabia’s capital. There’s been a complete executive overhaul at the top of the league, and the big change on the course is that LIV will play 72-hole events for the first time in the hope of convincing the Official World Golf Ranking board to award its players ranking points. Maybe just as important: Will American golf fans care? LIV remains a fringe entity among U.S. TV viewers—viewership on Fox averaged a paltry 338,000 in 2025—and the prospects for improvement would seem slim, with five-time major winner Brooks Koepka leaving and no impactful offseason signings, while considering that only four of the currently scheduled 12 tournaments for 2026 will be played in America. After events in Saudi Arabia, Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Africa and Mexico City, the league finally arrives in the U.S. (at Trump National in Virginia) in early May, when the PGA Tour will have already played 17 tournaments. For those keeping score at home, Victor Perez was LIV’s biggest offseason acquisition, while on the way out for sure is Henrik Stenson, and—at least before the LIV Promotions Event (Jan. 8-11)—relegated players Andy Ogletree and Mito Pereira, the latter announcing his reitrement, at 30.

Genesis Invitational, Riviera C.C., Los Angeles (Feb. 19-22)

The tragic February wildfires in Los Angeles threatened Genesis host site Riviera Country Club, and though the golf course and its historic clubhouse were spared, the nearby Pacific Palisades community was largely destroyed. The tour had to move the signature event south to Torrey Pines, and it was Ludvig Aberg who prevailed. He’ll make his defense at Riviera, where locals will celebrate the return, but not without the thoughts that those most affected by the fires in L.A. are still far from having their lives returned to normal.

Players Championship, TPC Sawgrass, Ponte Vedra, Beach, Fla. (March 12-15)

Rory McIlroy’s playoff win over J.J. Spaun at TPC Sawgrass in 2025 was, in hindsight, quite the teaser for the rest of the season. McIlroy would capture the Masters and career Grand Slam one month later, and Spaun shocked the world with his victory in the U.S. Open. After two straight Players wins, Scottie Scheffler never got it going and settled for a T-20—his last finish outside the top 10 for the rest of theseason. Vengeance could be his.

Masters, Augusta National G.C., Augusta, Ga. (April 9-12)

Augusta National

Rory crying from the depths of his soul. You don’t top that. Ever. There’s not a single potential scenario that could beat McIlroy completing the career slam, so we’ll just have to settle for the usual beauty and drama at Augusta National. The list of major winners who are overdue for a green jacket is pretty decent: Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Xander Schauffele, Justin Thomas, Collin Morikawa and Jason Day.

Chevron Championship, TBD (April 23-26)

The LPGA's first major of the season gets more curious by the year. Chevron moved the tournament from the California desert and closer to its home base in Houston in 2023, and after three years at Carlton Woods, the LPGA said the event in moving to another site in the area—but hasn’t yet announced where. The rumored spot is the municipal Memorial Park Golf Course, but the tour still has “To Be Confirmed” for the site on its official schedule. Our plea for wherever they settle: Please don’t try to again replicate the Poppie's Pond dive from the Dinah Shore. It’s embarrassing.

U.S. Women’s Open, Riviera C.C., Los Angeles (June 4-7)

Carlos Amoedo

Four months after the PGA Tour returns to Riviera, the USGA closes a far longer gap. Incredibly, a professional national championship has not been held at one of America’s greatest courses since Ben Hogan won his first U.S. Open at Riv in 1948. The USGA put an end to that drought by awarding Riviera the 2031 U.S. Open, but before that it stages the U.S. Women’s Open for the first time. “Just being in Los Angeles, I think there’s the chance to shine a brighter spotlight on women’s golf. I think it’s going to be amazing,” said John Bodenheimer, the USGA’s chief championships officer. “L.A. is the entertainment capital of the world; there’s Hollywood, the culture, the food, the beach. And there’s nothing quite like being on the West Coast when we’ll be playing a little closer to prime time (in the East).”

PGA Championship, Aronimink G.C., Newtown Square, Pa. (May 14-17)

PGA of America

It’s a big summer for Philadelphia. The 250th birthday of the country will be celebrated on the Fourth of July, and a couple of weeks before, golf takes the stage for the 107th PGA at Aronimink—22 miles from Independence Hall. Designed by Donald Ross and opened in 1896, Aronimink has hosted a variety of significant championships, though never a U.S. Open. The PGA of America has favored it for decades, with Gary Player winning the first and only PGA Championship played there in 1962, ahead of John Jacobs capturing the 2003 Senior PGA and Sei Young Kim winning the 2020 Women’s PGA. Aronimink has hosted three PGA Tour events over the last 15 years, and among the champions are a couple of potential sleepers for this year’s PGA: Justin Rose (2010 AT&T National) and Keegan Bradley (2018 BMW Championship). Scottie Scheffler is the defending champ after winning by five shots at Quail Hollow.

U.S. Open, Shinnecock Hills G.C., Southampton, N.Y. (June 18-21)

Copyright USGA/John Mummert

There are few venues more associated with USGA history than the 134-year-old layout near the eastern tip of Long Island. Shinnecock Hills held the second U.S. Open ever in 1896 and it has hosted five more—the last coming in 2018, when Brooks Koepka won a second straight national title by beating Tommy Fleetwood by a single shot. That’s intriguing, obviously, because Fleetwood heads into the ’26 campaign as one of the hottest players on the planet. Beyond a worthy winner, the USGA and Shinnecock would like to avoid controversy. The 2004 U.S. Open was marred by windblown, unplayable greens that resulted in a final-round scoring average of 78.7, and in ’18, a frustrated Phil Mickelson caused a rules uproar when he stroked his ball back toward the hole as it headed toward rolling off the green. Mickelson ended up with a 10 and got scorched by fans for essentially showing his middle finger to the rules and USGA. “Toughen up, because this is not meant that way,” Mickelson said in the aftermath. “I just wanted to get on to the next hole.”

Open Championship, Royal Birkdale G.C., Southport, England (July 16-19)

Richard Heathcote/R&A

Beyond its stark white, art deco clubhouse, Royal Birkdale—ranked 17th among Golf Digest’s World’s 100 Greatest—lacks the instant recognizability of some other renowned British courses, but its championship pedigree compares to all but a few. Among the Open winners there: Peter Thomson (twice), Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, Johnny Miller, Tom Watson, Mark O’Meara and Padraig Harrington. You’ll remember the last champ there in 2017: Jordan Spieth, whose travails with an unplayable lie on Sunday is the stuff of legend, as is his five-under finish over the last five holes to secure the third leg of the career Grand Slam. Broken record: Scottie Scheffler defends after a four-shot victory at Royal Portrush.

Tour Championship, East Lake G.C., Atlanta (Aug. 27-30)

The FedEx Cup Playoffs get off to their usual start with the FedEx St. Jude Championship (Aug. 13-16) in Memphis, and then the BMW Championship (Aug. 20-23) takes an interesting turn to Bellerive Country Club in St. Louis. The tour pros were last there for the 2017 PGA, when Brooks Koepka held off Tiger Woods, while Camillo Villegas won the last tour playoff event held at Bellerive in 2008. Then it’s on to East Lake, which got one of the tour’s feel-good stories of the year with the victory by Tommy Fleetwood in the first finale in seven years without a staggered start.

Walker Cup, Lahinch G.C., Lahinch, Ireland (Sept. 5-6)

Wait, isn’t the Walker Cup a biennial event? And didn’t it just get played at Cypress Point? The answers are yes and yes, but the USGA and R&A decided that they wanted to move it away from the same years as the Ryder Cup, and thus we get back-to-back Walker Cups. The last two venues are the stuff of legend, St. Andrews and Cypress Point, but Lahinch is no slouch with its history—originally laid out by Old Tom Morris and redesigned by Alister MacKenzie in 1927. Deemed too compact to host a major championship, Lahinch nonetheless got the 2019 Irish Open won by Jon Rahm. The Great Britain & Ireland team needs some home soil magic: Their last win was at Royal Lytham and St. Anne’s in 2015.

Solheim Cup, Bernardus Golf, North Brabant, Netherlands (Sept. 11-13)

Maddie Meyer

Dutch women’s golf is light on standouts, though Anne van Dam has played in both the Olympics and Solheim Cup. But the Netherlands nevertheless gets the opportunity to host a Solheim that has the Americans defending after beating Europe in Virginia in 2023. Europe will be trying to win or retain the Cup for a third straight time on home soil. After two matches with the same captains, both sides have new leaders—Angela Stanford guiding the U.S. and Anna Nordqvist helming for Europe.

Presidents Cup, Medinah C.C., Medinah, Ill. (Sept. 24-27)

Evan Schiller/Medinah Country Club

Very brave of the PGA of America to tab Medinah for the Presidents Cup, considering the epic U.S. Sunday collapse there in the 2012 Ryder Cup. But we’re talking about the Internationals being the foes this time, and we know how that has gone wherever they play: The U.S. has 13 wins and the Internationals have one, along with one tie. The 2023 Presidents Cup in Montreal was spirited and chippy at times, but nothing like the fan disaster at the Bethpage Ryder Cup. With good-guy captains Brandt Snedeker and Geoff Ogivly, we will hope the Presidents remains the much more amiable younger brother.