The LIV Golf Team Championship finale at Maridoe Golf Club was full of surprises, with the lead traded back and forth multiple times.
In the end, the season was decided by three strokes as Cam Smith’s Ripper GC emerged victorious as the 2024 LIV Golf team champs.
The Rippers to seized control late on Sunday with a series of clutch birdies from team captain Cam Smith and Lucas Herbert, coupled with costly missed putts and mishits by 4Aces.
The Aussie squad finished with an 11-under score to claim the league’s 2024 team trophy and bevy of cash prizes.
“It’s so good … not only great golfers but they’re better people and I think that’s what being a Ripper is all about,” said Smith, while being doused in champagne on the 18th green.
“To have those guys out there today to lean on, there was something telling me that we were going to be alright.”
After two days of traditional team match play, featuring singles and foursomes, LIV Golf’s finals reverted to stroke play with all four team players counting toward their team’s final score.
With Saturday’s semi-final winners the only eligible teams to claim Sunday’s big prize, all eyes (and TV cameras) were focused exclusively on four teams: Legion XIII, Ripper GC, 4Aces GC and Iron Heads GC.
The all-Australian foursome, who won back-to-back events earlier this year at LIV Golf Adelaide and LIV Golf Singapore, entered Dallas as the No. 3 seed. The road to the finals came via a quarter-final bye, followed by a 2-1 victory over Sergio Garcia’s Fireballs GC in the semis.
On Sunday, it was a classic team effort that powered Ripper GC to the No. 1 podium. Smith shot 4-under 68, highlighted by three late birdies; Herbert reeled off a hat trick on 15, 16 and 17 to post 3-under 69. Meanwhile, Marc Leishman and Matt Jones shot matching 2-under 70s to add four important points.
The Aces finished runner-up ahead of Iron Heads GC by virtue of the tiebreaker, with both teams finishing at 8 under.
The 13th-seeded Iron Heads GC, led by Captain Kevin Na, showed some match-play magic on the first two days in Dallas, reaching the finals by knocking off Brooks Koepka’s No. 4 seed Smash GC in the quarterfinals and Bryson DeChambeau’s No. 1 seed Crushers GC in the semifinals.
Legion XIII, who won a League best four times in 2024, finished in fourth place at 6 under. The expansion franchise was trying to overcome the loss of their captain and 2024 Individual Champion Jon Rahm, who withdrew before the tournament started with severe flu-like symptoms and was replaced by LIV Golf reserve player, John Catlin.
2024 LIV GOLF TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
TIER 1 – CHAMPIONSHIP
1. RIPPER GC -11 (Smith 68, Herbert 69, Jones 70, Leishman 70)
2. 4ACES GC -8 (Johnson 69, Reed 69, Perez 71, Varner III 71)
3. IRON HEADS GC -8 (Kozuma 69, Na 69, Lee 70, Vincent 72)
4. LEGION XIII -6 (Hatton 68, Catlin 70, Surratt 71, Vincent 73)
TIER 2 – CHAMPIONSHIP
5. STINGER GC -15 (Grace 65, Schwartzel 66, Oosthuizen 68, Burmester 74)
6. FIREBALLS GC -14 (Garcia 66, Ancer 68, Chacarra 69, Puig 71)
7. CRUSHERS GC -2 (Casey 69, Lahiri 70, DeChambeau 73, Howell III 73)
8. HYFLYERS GC -2 (Steele 68, Ogletree 70, Tringale 72, Mickelson 76)
TIER 3
9. MAJESTICKS GC -5 (Horsfield 69, Poulter 71, Westwood 71, Stenson 72)
10. TORQUE GC -4 (Muñoz 64, Ortiz 71, Niemann 74, Pereira 75)
11. CLEEKS GC -1 (Kaymer 70, Bland 70, Samooja 71, Meronk 76)
12. RANGEGOATS GC +4 (Uihlein 69, Watson 73, Pieters 73, Wolff 77)
13. SMASH GC +12 (McDowell 71, Gooch 71, Kokrak 78, Koepka 80)
LIV Golf Communications press release used to produce post.
