2026 Zurich Classic Preview: Everything You Need To Know About TPC Louisiana
Another week of PGA TOUR action brings us to TPC Louisiana, with the 2026 Zurich Classic next on tap. Compare Zurich Classic odds at the best sports betting sites to increase your potential PGA TOUR golf betting payouts. Brooks Kopeka & Shane Lowry and Ben Griffin & Andrew Novak project as the top groups for this upcoming tournament.
Time for a quick break from standard stroke play as the PGA TOUR heads to TPC Louisiana. The 2026 Zurich Classic is on tap, and we’ll attempt to navigate this two-man team event with all the info, trends, and stats you need to know about this nuanced tournament. It’s become polarizing, as golf fans either hate the change of pace and choose to skip watching and/or betting on it, or they enjoy seeing some of the game’s best pair up in a refreshing new format. I fall into the latter camp.
I really like this event, and it’s continued to attract some very competitive fields over its short history. The winning duo each receives $1.5M, 400 FedEx Cup points, and invites to the upcoming PGA Championship, The Sentry, and THE PLAYERS Championship. It proved to be a launching pad of a week for 2025 champions Ben Griffin and Andrew Novak, and it will hold every competitor’s full attention yet again in 2026. It’s also a great opportunity to find an edge in the golf betting market and in DFS, with many not knowing exactly how to approach research or handicapping Zurich Classic odds. That is (hopefully) where we step in!
ZURICH CLASSIC ODDS: THE FAVORITES
Find golfers priced lower than 20-1 below. Scroll to the bottom for complete outright odds at legal U.S. sportsbooks.
- Matt Fitzpatrick & Alex Fitzpatrick: +1175
- Brooks Koepka & Shane Lowry: +1550
- Sudarshan Yellamaraju & Ryan Gerard: +1750
- Andrew Novak & Ben Griffin: +1850
- Michael Thorbjornsen & Karl Vilips: +1950
THE FIELD AT A GLANCE
There are 148 players in the field this week, technically the largest of the season. The field will be grouped into 74 teams of two, with the top 33 pairs and ties advancing through the 36-hole cut.
After having the Masters and the RBC Heritage Signature events in successive weeks, this quirky team play setup serves as a natural bye week for elite players. Only two OWGR top-30 players are in the field this week: Matt Fitzpatrick (No. 7) and Ben Griffin (No. 16). That is a considerable dropoff from recent years, with repeat contenders like Xander Schauffele, Patrick Cantlay, Rory McIlroy, Collin Morikawa, and Sam Burns all absent this week.
Shane Lowry & Brooks Koepka are in a league of their own with six career major championships between them. Brooks is making his first Zurich Classic start since 2019, where he partnered up with his brother, Chase. Lowry will look to chase his second career win at this event, winning alongside Rory McIlroy in 2024.
In addition, other marquee pairings at the top of the projected Zurich Classic odds board include Ben Griffin & Andrew Novak, Wyndham Clark & Taylor Moore, Mackenzie Hughes & Taylor Pendrith, Sahith Theegala & Aaron Rai, and Matt Fitzpatrick & Alex Fitzpatrick.
Beyond the defending champions of Griffin & Novak, Hardy & Riley are the only other past champion pair returning this week.
Shane Lowry, Ryan Palmer, Billy Horschel, Nick Watney, and Scott Piercy are past Team Stroke Play winners of this event, who are back in the field with new partners this year.
Team Superlatives
It’s not enough to handicap the Zurich Classic on the merit of each team’s form and prospects to contend. Here are the most notable team pairings to watch this week.
- Most Likely to Lead The Field In Ball Striking and Miss The Cut Anyway: Brennan & Keefer
- These two are mirror images of each other. Young, transcendent ball-striking talents who have been lost on and around the greens. They will be an adventure worth following.
- Most Likely To Launch a Buddy Cop Series: Putnam & Smotherman
- Andrew’s Puttin ’em behind bars. Austin’s prosecuting some other man.
- Most Likely to Start a Law Firm: Neergaard Petersen & Skov Olesen
- Cracking down on Danish theft (amongst other breakfast pastries)
- Most Likely To Injure a Patron: Sargent & Dunlap
- Two of the least accurate players in PGA Tour history have decided mis-hittery loves company. Keep your head on a swivel if you’re in or around Avondale this week!
- Most Unlikely Pairing: Skinns and Mullinax
- Just your average 44-year-old Englishman and 33-year-old Alabaman joining forces. Skinns did play collegiately at the University of Tennessee, so maybe it’s the SEC rivalry that’s brought these two together just outside of Baton Rouge.
TEAM STROKE PLAY FORMAT & FIELD OVERVIEW
- Thursday: Four-Ball (Best Ball)
- Friday: Foursomes (Alternate Shot)
- CUT: Top 33 Pairs & Ties Advance
- Saturday: Four-Ball (Best Ball)
- Sunday: Foursomes (Alternate Shot)
Here is the official explanation from the Zurich Classic website of how the format is broken down:
For Four-Ball play, the players on each team will each play his own ball throughout the entirety of the round, with the best score on each hole recorded. Example: On the first hole, both golfers on each team tee off. Player A pars the hole and Player B birdies it. The team will be credited with a birdie.
For Foursomes play, players will rotate tee shots. One player will hit the tee shots on all the odd-numbered holes, and the other will hit the tee shot on even-numbered holes. Example: Player A and Player B are partners. On the first hole, Player A tees off; Player B plays the second shot; Player A plays the third shot; and so on until the ball is holed. The total strokes taken will result in the team’s score for that hole.
Last year, Ben Griffin & Andrew Novak won with a final score of -28. They separated from the field by shooting a combined -21 in their two rounds of Four Ball. Typically, we have seen championship teams with the greatest birdie-making upside separate themselves in Four Ball and tread water in Alternate Shot.
INTRODUCTION TO TPC LOUISIANA
TPC Louisiana is a Pete Dye-designed, 7,400-yard Par 72 located in Avondale. If TPC courses share an identity of fan-friendly, templated scoring holes – and Pete Dye Courses share a tendency for positional angles off-the-tee and around-the-green emphasis – this course definitely leans more towards the former. There are persistent bunkers and some fun, random hazards like trees in the center of the fairway that have Dye’s hands all over them. But, there are plenty of scoring opportunities on this course.
Over the years, we’ve seen plenty of players, both individually and in team play, find success here despite not being strong off the tee. I would view this as a glorified second-shot course that emphasizes strong approach play to avoid greenside water and bunkers.
The Zurich Classic was a standard Individual Stroke Play event from 1938-2016. Stuard won the 2016 Zurich Classic, and if Stuard wins an event, it needs to be gutted and reinvented completely to protect the TOUR’s integrity. He has not won a TOUR event since.
EVENT HISTORY AND COURSE COMPS
Since 2017, the Zurich Classic has been contested as a team event. There are 14 individuals who have multiple T15 finishes over the last five years: Shane Lowry, Billy Horschel, Ryan Palmer, Charley Hoffman, Nick Watney, Jason Dufner, Adam Hadwin, Troy Merritt, Taylor Moore, Aaron Rai, David Lipsky, Scott Piercy, Davis Riley, and Keith Mitchell.
Horschel and Palmer are the only players in this year’s field with three career top-10 finishes in the team play format since 2017.
Billy Horschel was a winner of this event in 2018 with Scott Piercy and also won individually at the 2013 Zurich Classic. Horschel has played alongside Sam Burns in three of the last four years, contending each time with finishes of T11, T4, and second. He missed the cut alongside Tyson Alexander in 2024, missed 2025 due to injury, and will tee it up with a new partner, Tom Hoge, in 2026.
Course Comps
This is definitely a subjective week to use the good old-fashioned eye test over any hyper-analyzed start modeling. If we want to reference some recent courses that reward a similar style of play, I like TPC Twin Cities, Detroit Golf Club, TPC Sawgrass, Austin CC, TPC Craig Ranch, and TPC Scottsdale as a collection of TPC-style and/or Pete Dye Courses that favor plus-distance and reward the best iron players that given week.
The 3M Open leaderboard continues to jump out from a correlation standpoint. Martin Laird, Sam Ryder, Billy Horschel, Beau Hossler, Garrick Higgo, Cameron Champ, Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel, Keith Mitchell, Brandt Snedeker, Pat Perez, Tony Finau, and Scott Piercy all finished top 20 at both over the last five years.
Looking at the 2025 3M Open leaderboard, Kurt Kitayama, Sam Stevens, Jake Knapp, and David Lipsky each finished top-3 at the 3M Open and have strong history at TPC Louisiana. Stevens and Lipsky are in the Zurich Classic field and may be worth consideration if this trend continues.
KEY STATS TO CONSIDER
- Recent Form (SG: TOT, SG: T2G)
- Birdies or Better Gained
- SG: T2G (>7,400 Yard Courses)
- P4: 450-500
- SG: P – Bermuda
- Comp Course History
I’ll be ditching the advanced metrics and taking a subjective route this week. I’m mainly focused on comfortable pairings that are comprised of the players with the best total form (SG: TOT L36). I’m also looking for players who are aggressive enough to generate the most birdie opportunities (Birdies or Better Gained), as this will help teams create separation on the Four-Ball days.
The top 10 teams in terms of average SG: TOT rankings are:
- Smalley & Springer
- Champ & Silverman
- Lowry & Koepka
- Putnam & Smotherman
- Bauchou & Stevens
- Snedeker & Mitchell
- Smith & Li
- Gerard & Ford
- Fitzpatrick & Fitzpatrick
- Theegala & Rai
The top 10 teams in terms of Birdies or Better Gained are:
- Brennan & Keefer
- Griffin & Novak
- Gerard & Ford
- Champ & Silverman
- Smalley & Springer
- Meissner & McCarty
- Moore & Clark
- Skinns & Mullinax
- Putnam & Smotherman
- Schmid & Power
With this being a team format, there is merit to the thought that you are only as strong as your weakest link, as you cannot excel in alternate shot on Friday and Sunday single handedly. With that in mind, the top 10 players who represent the second-best combination of SG: TOT + Birdie or Better Gained on their teams are: Alex Smalley, Cameron Champ, Andrew Putnam, David Ford, Shane Lowry, Max McGreevy, Matt McCarty, Jordan Smith, Davis Thompson, and Zach Bouchou
Team Reshuffling
This is not your average week on the PGA TOUR schedule. Standard strokes gained stats go by the wayside in favor of more subjective metrics like team chemistry. While the list of individuals who found success here doesn’t favor one type of player in particular, there seems to be a stronger trend of duos who have played well before. The following groups have played together multiple times at this event with at least one top-12 finish together:
- Hoffman & Watney
- Hardy & Riley
- Griffin & Novak
- Clark & Moore
- Fitzpatrick & Fitzpatrick
- Vilips & Thorbjornsen
Putting team camaraderie to the test, these groups have each had individual success, but will be playing the event as a team for the first time:
- Koepka & Lowry
- Finau & Greyserman
- Snedeker & Mitchell
- Horschel & Hoge
- Theegala & Rai
Correlated Stats
While I won’t be running a model this week, there is still historical Strokes Gained data available at TPC Louisiana from its individual stroke play days. Based on the correlation charts below, below we can see Bogeys Avoided and SG: OTT are less important on this track than TOUR average. On the other hand, SG: Ball Striking, SG: APP, and SG: Par 5 see the biggest boost in importance at TPC Louisiana.
TEAM SPOTLIGHT: MICHAEL THORBJORNSEN & KARL VILIPS
When it comes to team golf, I’m significantly higher on the subjectivity of team chemistry and comfort level playing together than I am on blanket form. This tournament produces out-of-nowhere contenders all the time, such as Taylor Dickson & Trace Crowe last year (T4) or Martin Trainer & Chad Ramey & Martin Trainer in 2024 (2nd). They all harp on the importance of a “comfortable pairing” and not having to apologize to their partner when they strike a poor shot.
This year, we have far fewer repeat pairings than usual at this event, so a proven duo like Thorbjornsen and Vilips holds even more value. Thorbjorsen and Vilips were standout teammates during their time at Stanford and have remained close in their professional careers.
The two bombers shined in their respective Zurich Classic debuts, finishing T4 in 2025. Much is said about complementary players in this format (i.e. an accurate plodder and great putter complementing a pure bomber and poor putter), but I’m drawn to a combination like this that are used to hitting driver-wedge on repeat.
TPC Louisiana is on the longer side of PGA Tour venues, and plays even longer than the scorecard yardage, often featuring soft grounds and played at sea level. That offers a distinct advantage to this pair of long hitters.
Both Vilips and Thorbjorsen are in improved form in 2026, and have the combination of form, fit, and familiarity I’m looking for in a Zurich Classic contender.
WHAT TO WATCH FOR AT THE 2026 ZURICH CLASSIC
I’m not going to attempt to bucket these team pairings into projected pricing tiers this week. In lieu of any short-listed player pools, I’ve pulled together the below ranker chart to evaluate each team based on average trending form and birdie-making ability entering this event. When odds are released, I’ll compare against these rankings to identify where the greatest value lies. At a glance, I would anticipate Smalley & Springer, McCarty & Meissner, Gerard & Ford, and Brennan & Keefer as being potential values on the betting board.
When Zurich Classic odds open, I’m eyeing a longer card centered around mid-tier pairings like Theegala & Rai, Thorbjornsen & Vilips, McCarty & Meissner, and Kim & Yu. While Koepka & Lowry project as the prohibitive favorites, this format lends itself to some surprise longshots catching fire, similar to what we saw with Riley & Hardy a couple years ago.
It’s a good week to take a step back from the stat modeling and just enjoy a fun change of pace format, hoping for the best that we can get a Sunday sweat to look forward to.
Best of luck navigating 2026 Zurich Classic odds!
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2026 ZURICH CLASSIC ODDS
With a Monday finish at the RBC Heritage, most books have not opened Zurch Classic odds, as of Monday morning. DraftKings Sportsbook was the first regulated sportsbook to do so. Here are the opening odds. This section will be updated as more sportsbooks offer odds.
- Odds TBD
Photo Credit: AP/Gerald Herbert
