NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. — Corey Conners was hitting the ball like his old self Thursday at the PGA Championship.
And now the Canadian has a solid chance to win his first major in the early goings at Aronimink Golf Club.
Conners shot a 2-under 68 Thursday and at one point held a share of the lead. He made just one bogey — on the par-4 15th after hitting his approach into the greenside bunker — but his otherwise steady game was perfect for the tricky conditions presented to the field in Thursday’s opener.
He finished the first round just one shot back of the lead held by seven players including the defending champion, Scottie Scheffler.
Conners birdied the par-5 9th and rattled off back-to-back birdies on Nos. 12 and 13. It, frankly, could have been even better. Conners missed five birdie attempts from inside 15 feet on Thursday, and two of those were inside 10 feet. Still, he was the best of the bunch in strokes gained: approach the green and second in the field in strokes gained: tee to green.
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“I felt like I hit the ball really well. There's a number of demanding shots that everybody faces out there and was able to execute some pretty good ones at important times to kind of keep the momentum going and keep the stress level at a minimum,” Conners said.
His ball-striking, Conners has said previously, hasn’t been as good as he’s come to expect so far in 2026 — but he put on a tee-to-green clinic Thursday at Aronimink. It’s the kind of effort he’ll need more of if he hopes to climb the board more heading into the weekend — especially staring up at Scheffler, who has now been ranked No. 1 in the world for more than 150 weeks in a row.
“I think the way the course was playing (with) the wind up quite a bit, bogeys could happen really easily. I was fortunate to hit the ball quite well and keep myself out of trouble for the most part,” Conners said. “I had a few reasonable lies when I did hit it in the rough and was able to advance the ball up around the greens. But a lot of good ball striking today kept me in position to try and make birdies, if not pars.”
Conners was looking to become the first Canadian male since Adam Hadwin in 2022 at the U.S. Open to own at least a share of a first-round lead at a major. Conners himself led the PGA Championship after Thursday in 2021, but prior to that a Canadian wasn’t that high up on a major leaderboard after the opening day since Mike Weir all the way back in 2009.
Conners will get right back out early on Friday to try to keep the train going.
“I feel like I'm excited to get going again in the morning. Had some good momentum going today, try to keep that going into Friday,” Conners said. “Still lots of golf to be played, but I like how I played today and can take the same feeling into tomorrow.”
Conners wasn’t the lone Canadian in red figures Thursday as Nick Taylor leaned on a hot putter — gaining more than three shots on the field with the flatstick — to finish at 1 under. He’s tied for 15th and just two shots back.
Taylor told Sportsnet earlier in the week that the putter he’s using now is actually the same red-painted one he used to win the RBC Canadian Open in 2023. He had switched it out to try something new at the beginning of the year, but since going back to “old red,” he called it, Taylor notched back-to-back top-15 finishes heading into the PGA Championship.
Taylor Pendrith shot 2-over 72 — a round he felt was better than his score indicated, he told Sportsnet — while Sudarshan Yellamaraju struggled in his major-championship debut, shooting a 5-over 75.
