Scheffler and McIlroy rebound as windy Aronimink tests PGA field

Aronimink Golf Club tightened its grip on the 108th PGA Championship on Friday, with wind turning Round 2 into a stress test that separated proven major contenders from players trying to survive a hot start. The official leaderboard had Alex Smalley, Aldrich Potgieter and Maverick McNealy near the top as play unfolded, but the more telling picture came just behind them, where Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas, Hideki Matsuyama, Jon Rahm and Cameron Young were positioned to make a move on a course that had already asked far more questions than it answered.

The setup rewarded precision over raw power, and Aronimink delivered exactly the kind of examination the PGA of America wanted from the only all-professional major in golf. The 154-man field included 15 past PGA champions and 29 major winners, and on a restored Donald Ross layout renovated by Gil Hanse from 2016 to 2018, every mistake around the thick rough and complex greens carried real weight. Friday’s gusts only sharpened that challenge, with the PGA Tour describing Aronimink as baring its teeth.

Scheffler arrived in Round 2 after opening with a 3-under 67 and made clear how much the course was demanding from the best in the game. He called the pin placements the hardest he had ever played and described them as “kind of absurd,” while stopping short of calling them unfair. That distinction mattered: Aronimink was not simply punishing players for poor swings, it was exposing who could keep attacking under major-championship pressure and who would retreat into survival mode.

McIlroy’s rebound carried the same kind of importance. A frustrating start had left him needing a response, and his move on Friday mattered less as a line on the board than as a sign that the game’s most accomplished players were beginning to solve the course under harsher conditions. That is the difference Aronimink has imposed so far between a fleeting run and a championship challenge that can last four days.

The stage only reinforced the stakes. Aronimink was hosting the PGA Championship for the second time and the first time since 1962, when Gary Player won there. Player plans to attend this year’s championship as a past champion, after Aronimink granted him honorary membership and renamed one of its rooms the Gary Player Lounge. With expanded coverage from ESPN, CBS Sports and a live range show, the pressure on the field was visible from every angle, but Friday made one point unmistakable: major championships are won by the players who hold up when the wind rises and the course stops yielding.