Going into the final-day’s singles matches with an 11-7 lead, the Americans held off a spirited International team with Xander Schauffele sinking the winning putt in his match to get to the 15.5 points required for victory.
The USA now leads the overall series against the International team (which excludes players from Europe) 12-1 with one match tied.
Having never been beaten on home soil, Davis Love III’s team were heavy favourites going into the 14th edition of the biennial team contest against Trevor Immelman’s inexperienced International team.
Due to LIV golfers being banned from the tournament, the Americans were without Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka, but were still able to field 10 of the world’s top 16-ranked players in its team.
The International team contained eight rookies due to the absence of LIV players Open champion Cameron Smith, Chile’s rising star Joaquin Niemann, Mexico’s Abraham Ancer, South Africa’s Louis Oosthuizen and Australia’s Marc Leishman.
The Americans lead 4-1 after day one’s foursomes, and then won three of Friday’s five fourball matches, with the other two ending tied, to open an 8-2 lead.
Saturday morning’s foursomes were shared 2-2, before the International team won the afternoon’s fourballs 3-1 with South Korea’s Tom Kim leading the charge.
The 20-year-old, the youngest player at Quail Hollow, earned his team a point against Scottie Scheffler and Sam Burns in the foursomes and then another alongside Si Woo Kim against Patrick Cantlay and Schauffele in the fourballs.
Despite his fist-pumping heroics, Team USA went into the final day’s 12 singles matches with a four point lead, needing just four and a half more points to claim the trophy.
Jordan Spieth won the first point of the day to become only the sixth player in the event’s history to win all five matches. Team-mate Justin Thomas however failed to add his name to this list when he suffered a final-hole loss against Si Woo Kim.
Thomas did have an early lead in the match but was angered by the South Korean not conceding a birdie putt from inside three feet at the ninth and never recovered.
Cantlay and Tony Finau then won their matches and Sam Burns earned half a point before Schauffele beat Corey Conners to take Team USA to 15.5 points with five matches still left out on the course.
Since the tournament’s inception in 1994, the only International team victory came at Royal Melbourne in Australia in 1998. There was a tie in 2003 in South Africa.
