{"id":23195,"date":"2026-06-18T17:25:07","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T17:25:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/23195\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T17:25:07","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T17:25:07","slug":"u-s-open-2026-watch-18-year-old-phenom-mason-howell-out-drive-scottie-scheffler-by-14-yards-golf-news-and-tour-information","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/23195\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Open 2026: Watch 18-year-old phenom Mason Howell out-drive Scottie Scheffler by 14 yards(!) | Golf News and Tour Information"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>18-year-old Mason Howell looks his age \u2026 but appearances can be deceiving. The 2025 U.S. Amateur winner golfer is a stick in both build and skill and proved it during his first-ever U.S. Open round on Thursday. Paired with World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, Howell\u201411 years Scheffler&#8217;s junior\u2014unleashed a monster drive on the par-4 third hole. Scheffler\u2019s salvo traveled an impressive 370 yards, but Howell wasn&#8217;t intimidated, replying with a 384-yard rocket that threatened to punch a hole in the overcast sky. The floor is yours, kid.<\/p>\n<p>Just a day after the USGA <a href=\"https:\/\/www.golfdigest.com\/story\/is-the-ball-rollback-dead--some-answers-after-today-s-distance-a\" class=\"editorial-link-no-style\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">announced plans<\/a> to delay golf-ball rollback until 2030, this is sure to ruffle a few traditionalist feathers. A 18-year-old bombing it nearly four-hundo at a U.S. Open? SIN, HERESY, WITCHCRAFT! But Scheffler, who hasn\u2019t even sniffed the other side of the hill at 29-years-old, would be the first to admit they\u2019re all starting from a level playing field. In this case, the elasticity of youth (and perhaps a fortuitous gust of wind) made the difference.<\/p>\n<p>At the end of the week, our money is still on Scheffler despite his (relative) struggles this season, but this highlight is proof Howell isn\u2019t overmatched playing against the big dogs, at least not physically. And soon enough, perhaps in a decade with a major title or two to his name, Howell will find himself in Scheffler&#8217;s spikes, being outdriven by some young gun at a U.S. Open. That\u2019s just the circle of life.<\/p>\n<p>MORE GOLF DIGEST U.S. OPEN COVERAGE<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"18-year-old Mason Howell looks his age \u2026 but appearances can be deceiving. The 2025 U.S. Amateur winner golfer&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[6418,9469,4413,7669,144,208,3812,82,1037,9470,1036,3771],"class_list":["post-23195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scottie-scheffler","tag-amateur","tag-driving-distance","tag-junior-golf","tag-miles-russell","tag-pga-tour","tag-scottie-scheffler","tag-shinnecock","tag-story","tag-us-open","tag-us-open-2026-watch-17-year-old-phenom-miles-russell-out-drive-scottie-scheffler-by-14-yards","tag-usopen2026","tag-viral-videos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}