The Northern Trust 2021 Overview
The 18-hole Championship Golf Course was designed by Tom Kite, the 1992 US Open Champion, and famous golf course architect Bob Cupp, who cooperated on the project. Liberty National’s parkland links style plan by Kite & Cupp is dramatic while remaining traditional, taking into account the site’s cultural heritage, aesthetic ideals, and light and shadow aspects. The Statue of Liberty, the New York Harbor, the Manhattan Skyline, and the Verrazano Narrows Bridge are all visible from the golf course.
If the wind picks up, we could see a winning score in the low teens, however if it were to remain calm throughout your going to have to go low, the course record is 62, it would be a shock if going this week.
Patrick Reed won The Northern Trust event in 2019 with a winning score of -16. When it was known as The Barclays and hosted at Liberty National in 2009 and 2013, the winning scores were 9 and 11 under par, respectively. In 2013, Adam Scott won a nail-biting Sunday fight with Tiger Woods, Justin Rose, and Gary Woodland T2, and Phil Mickelson T6.
Comments from the designers:
“You need to drive it fairly straight at Liberty National, and the greens are such that if you don’t drive it straight it is tough to get to the pin,” Kite says. “What I try to do is not have any one part of the game dominate. I don’t want it to be just a putting course or just a bombers course. I want you to be rewarded for length, accuracy, iron shots, chipping and bunker shots. And, of course, putting will always be there.
Adds Cupp: “We were together on this and I don’t think we ever had a disagreement on the aesthetics. Tactically, Tom’s knowledge goes beyond perfection. And it’s also about the conditioning of the golf course and also what the player feels when you play the golf course, what your senses record, what you see.”
Key Skill Sets Required
- SG Off the tee – The fairways are fairly generous here, and those that hit it long and accurately will certainly hold an advantage over the field.
- SG around the green – 2019 winner of the Northern Trust Patrick Reed showed just how important SG around the green is. This demanding layout with sand a plenty will require a solid short game.
- GIR Gained – the greens here are harder to hit than average on the PGA Tour so I will be looking for player who consistently find the greens in regulation. Small green will mean those finding them will have plenty of birdie looks.
- SG putting on Bentgrass Greens.
- Overall SG T2G – This is a long and demanding course and without a solid T2G game , players will struggle to challenge the top of the leaderboard.