The seven players representing Team USA in golf at the 2024 Paris Olympics
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We look at the four men and three women representing the USA at Paris 2024 – plus the reason the USA has more golfers in the field than any other country.
The USA’s hopes of Olympic glory in golf rest on the shoulders of Scottie Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, Wyndham Clark, and Collin Morikawa in the men’s golf, and Nelly Korda, Lilia Vu, and Rose Zhang in the women’s golf event.
The septet will be hoping to repeat the success of Tokyo 2020, which saw the USA win gold in the men’s and women’s golf thanks to Schauffele and Korda.
The men’s Olympic golf event takes place 1-4 August, while the women are in action 7-10 August. Both are being held at Le Golf National, host of the 2018 Ryder Cup and regular home of the French Open on the DP World Tour.
Why the USA has more golfers in the Olympics than any other nation
A total of 120 golfers will participate in the 2024 Olympics — 60 in the men’s competition and 60 in the women’s – the same number as at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
Two spots — one in the men’s field and one in the women’s — were set aside for host nation France. All five continents of the Olympic Movement (Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Oceania) were also guaranteed at least one male and one female competitor.
After that, the Olympics uses the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR) to select the rest of its participants. Each country is limited to two male and two female representatives, but with one exception. The top 15 players in the OWGR qualify automatically, although a maximum of four golfers per country can be selected from that group. The United States had nine golfers in the top 15 of the men’s OWGR, but could only take the four highest-ranking members of that group.
The USA had three women who met that criteria.
Team USA for golf at the Paris 2024 Olympics
Xander Schauffele
The 30-year-old finally broke his major duck at this year’s PGA Championship and then followed it with his second grand slam event at Royal Troon’s Open Championship.
He’s now ranked second in the world and will be defending the gold medal he won in Tokyo.
Scottie Scheffler
The most dominant run since peak Tiger Woods saw Scheffler bag five wins in two months while not finishing outside the top-20 from the start of the year to the US Open. A tough time at Pinehurst showed he’s human (and that being arrested isn’t conducive to major success), but he won the Travelers on his very next start. The world number one will be the man to beat in Paris.
Collin Morikawa
That the world number six (seven at the end of qualification) only just snuck into the team highlights USA’s strength in depth.
He finished in the top four at this year’s Masters and PGA Championship, in the top-16 at the US Open and The Open, and has only one winless season since turning pro.
A seven-man playoff saw him miss out on a bronze medal in Tokyo.
Wyndham Clark
While some golfers aren’t interested in the Olympics and withdraw themselves from contention, for Wyndham Clark it’s as big as it gets.
“The Ryder Cup in golf is kind of the biggest thing, but now that golf’s in the Olympics, it’s probably even bigger than that, because you’re representing your country at such a bigger level,” said the American, who will get his first taste of Olympic golf this year. “This probably ranks as the coolest team I’ve ever made, for sure.”
The 2023 US Open champ has experienced mixed fortunes in 2024. He won the Pebble Beach Pro-Am, finished second at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and The Players Championship, but missed the cut in three of the four majors and finished T56 in his US Open defence.
Nelly Korda
Quiet off the course but box office on it, the world number one has already won six times in 2024, including the Chevron Championship.
Three missed cuts in a row tempered expectations a touch, but her modus operandi tells us she’ll dominate the par 5s and she’s the clear favorite to repeat her gold medal exploits from Tokyo 2020.
Lilia Vu
A double major champion in 2023 and the second-best player in the world, Vu won on her return from injury at the Meijer LPGA Classic and then finished second at the Women’s PGA Championship a week later.
Rose Zhang
Hard to find fault in her game and has built a reputation as one of the best ball-strikers on tour. Zhang also ended Nelly Korda’s winning streak with a commanding display at the Cognizant Founders Cup in May. Expect the 21-yar-old to kick on now she’s finished her exams at Stanford until the winter.
- Find everything you need to know about the Olympic golf format here.
Team USA Olympic golf history
Athens 1986
The inaugural Olympic Games did not feature golf.
Paris 1900
Golf became an Olympic sport for the first time in the second-ever Olympics.
Charles Sands won gold for the USA in the men’s golf, while Margaret Abbott, Pauline Whittier, and Daria Pratt won gold, silver, and bronze in the women’s event.
St Louis 1904
There were two golf events at the 1904 Olympic Games. The first was a team championship open to golf associations and contested over 36 holes of stroke play by teams of ten amateur golfers, with all scores counting towards the team total.
It was followed by an individual event contested as a match play knockout by the leading 32 players following a 36-hole stroke play qualifying round, with each match played over 36 holes.
Only golfers from the United States of America competed, with 74 from America and three from Canada, ensuring a clean sweep of medals.
Rio de Janeiro 2016
Golf returned to the Olympics after a 112-year hiatus and Justin Rose marked the occasion by winning gold for Team GB, while Inbee Park took gold for South Korea in the women’s event.
Matt Kuchar took bronze, behind Rose and silver-medalist Henrik Stenson.
Rickie Fowler, Patrick Reed, Matt Kuchar, Stacy Lewis, Gerina Piller, and Lexi Thompson also represented the USA but finished outside the medal places.
Tokyo 2020 (hosted in 2021 due to Covid)
Xander Schauffele and Nelly Korda ensured a gold medal clean sweep for the USA.
Collin Morikawa missed out on bronze in a playoff.
Patrick Reed, Justin Thomas, Danielle Kang, Jessica Korda, and Lexi Thompson all finished some way off the medal places.
About the author
Rob McGarr – Contributing Editor
Rob has been a writer and editor for over 15 years, covering all manner of subjects for leading magazines and websites.
He has previously been Features Editor of Today’s Golfer magazine and Digital Editor of todays-golfer.com, and held roles at FHM, Men’s Running, Golf World, and MAN Magazine.
You can follow him on YouTube where – depending on what day of the week it is – he’ll either be trying his best to get his handicap down to scratch or shoving his clubs in a cupboard, never to be seen again.
Rob is a member at Royal North Devon, England’s oldest golf course, where he plays off a two-handicap.
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Seven golfers will represent Team USA at the Paris 2024 Olympics
