The USGA is famous for creating storylines with their groupings for America's national championship, often pairing some of the best players in the game or creating groups that have histories which will surely be storylines over the first two days of coverage. Mike Davis and company have done it again this year at Olympic, grouping Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, and Bubba Watson together. While Woods enters the week coming off a win at the Memorial, there are still questions about how his game will hold up at a major championship test. The Open consistently provides the toughest test of the season, and the Lake Course at Olympic is known for being one of the most difficult setups in the rota.
Mickeson and Watson also enter with questions. Lefty has a record five runner-ups in the U.S. Open, a championship that remains the "white whale" of his career. He enters after a WD at Muirfield Village, provoked by cellphone nuisance and "mental fatigue." Watson is playing in just his third tournament since winning the season's first major, and he was rusty in Columbus as well, coming up well short of the cut.
The USGA created a UK equivalent of that power group, putting Luke Donald, Rory McIlroy, and Lee Westwood together. All three have been ranked as the No. 1 player in the world over the past year, but only McIlroy has won a major. He. of course, enters the week looking to defend after a dominant performance in his coming-out party at Congressional CC last June. He had been looking for his form and missed three straight cuts before adding a late stop in Memphis last week, where he was in contention until he rinsed on No. 18.
Woods, Mickelson, and Watson will go off on Thursday at 10:33 a.m. ET while Donald, McIlroy, and Westwood will tee off at 4:29 p.m. ET. For the third time since 2008, the USGA has scheduled their most prestigious title to be largely conducted during primetime in the east -- a tradition started at Torrey Pines in 2008 and duplicated again at Pebble Beach in 2010. Due to the routing of the holes at the venerable Olympic Club, the split times will go off No. 9 tee as opposed to No. 10.
Morning wave off No. 1 tee:
10:15 a.m.: Scott Langley, Steve Lebrun, Beau Hossler (a)
10:26 a.m.: Jason Bohn, Raphael Jacquelin, J. B. Park
10:37 a.m.: Michael Thompson, TBD, Steve Marino
10:48 a.m.: Brendan Jones, George Coetzee, Gregory Bourdy
10:59 a.m.: Patrick Cantlay (a), Jonathan Byrd, Kyle Stanley
11:10 a.m.: Retief Goosen, Vijay Singh, Zach Johnson
11:21 a.m.: Paul Casey, Hiroyuki Fujita, Mark Wilson
11:32 a.m.: Adam Scott, Keegan Bradley, Webb Simpson
11:43 a.m.: Tim Clark Toru Taniguchi, Rod Pampling
11:54 a.m.: Francesco Molinari, Bo Van Pelt, Peter Hanson
12:05 p.m.: D. A. Points, Dong-Hwan Lee, Kevin Streelman
12:16 p.m.: Edward Loar, Paul Claxton, Alistair Presnell
12:27 p.m.: Mark McCormick, Nick Sherwood (a), Cole Howard
Morning wave off No. 9 tee:
10 a.m.: Shane Bertsch, Martin Flores, Tommy Biershenk
10:11 a.m.: Scott Piercy, Matthew Baldwin, Matt Bettencourt
10:22 a.m.: Thomas Bjorn, Kevin Na, Branden Grace
10:33 a.m.: Phil Mickelson, Tiger Woods, Bubba Watson
10:44 a.m.: Joe Ogilvie, Stephen Ames, Tim Herron
10:55 a.m.: Davis Love III, Padraig Harrington, David Toms
11:06 a.m.: Carl Pettersson, Charl Schwartzel, Charles Howell III
11:17 a.m.: Robert Karlsson, Bob Estes, Robert Rock
11:28 a.m.: K. J. Choi, Y. E. Yang, K. T. Kim
11:39 a.m.: Fredrik Jacobson, Robert Garrigus, Alexander Noren
11:50 a.m.: Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano, Sang-Moon Bae, Rafael Cabrera-Bello
12:01 p.m.: Marc Warren, Anthony Summers, Michael Allen
12:12 p.m.: Hunter Hamrick, Tim Weinhart, Scott Smith
Afternoon wave off No. 1 tee:
3:45 p.m.: Casey Martin, Cameron Wilson (a), Dennis Miller
3:56 p.m.: Jim Herman, William Lunde, David Mathis
4:07 p.m.: Nicolas Colsaerts, Charlie Wi, Simon Dyson
4:18 p.m.: Alvaro Quiros, Gary Woodland, John Senden
4:29 p.m.: Rory McIlroy, Luke Donald, Lee Westwood
4:40 p.m.: Jim Furyk, Sergio Garcia, Graeme McDowell
4:51 p.m.: Stewart Cink, Trevor Immelman, Lucas Glover
5:02 p.m.: Ernie Els, Geoff Ogilvy, Angel Cabrera
5:13 p.m.: Martin Laird, Ben Crane, Anders Hansen
5:24 p.m.: Matteo Manassero, Aaron Baddeley, Miguel Angel Jimenez
5:35 p.m.: Brian Harman, TBD, Mikko Ilonen
5:46 p.m.: Brice Garnett, TBD, Jesse Mueller
5:57 p.m.: Brian Rowell, Alberto Sanchez (a), Brian Gaffney
Afternoon wave off No. 9 tee:
3:30 p.m.: John Peterson, Morgan Hoffmann, Aaron Watkins
3:41 p.m.: Jeff Curl, Nicholas Thompson, Casey Wittenberg
3:52 p.m.: Soren Kjeldsen, Chez Reavie, Peter Lawrie
4:03 p.m.: Michael Campbell, Olin Browne, Joe Durant
4:14 p.m.: Bill Haas, Nick Watney, Brandt Snedeker
4:25 p.m.: Martin Kaymer, Hunter Mahan, Justin Rose
4:36 p.m.: Steve Stricker, Ian Poulter, Matt Kuchar
4:47 p.m.: Jason Day, Louis Oosthuizen, Jason Dufner
4:58 p.m.: Rickie Fowler, Ryo Ishikawa, Dustin Johnson
5:09 p.m.: Hunter Haas, Tadahiro Takayama, Lee Slattery
5:20 p.m.: Alex Cejka, Kevin Chappell, Blake Adams
5:31 p.m.: James Hahn, Darron Stiles, Roberto Castro
5:42 p.m.: Brooks Koepka (a), TBD, Samuel Osborne
For all your news and updates in the run up to the 2012 U.S. Open at Olympic, stay with this StoryStream. Be sure to head over to USOpen.com for even more coverage from the event.