U.S. Open 2025: Viktor Hovland got unlucky four times in a row—then shared some good advice
OAKMONT, Pa. — Oakmont is difficult enough without luck working against you, but the only way to avoid bad luck at a U.S. Open is to not hit anything resembling a below-average shot.
Hovland got the bad side of that draw—but there’s a lot the rest of us can learn from how he responded.
Here’s what happened: Hovland pulled a 3-wood on the short par-4 second hole and tried to hit a little left-to-right fade. It faded a little too much, landed about a foot in the rough, and bounced a few feet more to the right.
It was statistically Hovland’s worst drive of the day—he lost -0.95 shots to the field on that swing—but it deserved better than what he got.
“I didn’t want to miss it left off the tee, so I kind of oversliced it into the rough,” he says. “I was expecting a lie that I could just chase up the green, but I couldn’t even cover the bunker.”
It was an unfair, bad break that was about to get even worse.
Hovland took a big swipe but his ball barely advanced 45 yards. It dribbled slowly into the bunker—then rolled right up against the lip.
Another brutal break, and statistically his second-worst shot of the day—he lost -0.86 shots with that one.
Hovland’s lie was so bad he had to go sideways.
Then he actually hit a decent pitch shot—but with a touch too much spin. It checked up at about 15 feet then rolled all the way back down the hill, to almost 40 feet.
Then his tricky putt back up that steep hill from 40 feet burned the edge. It rolled out to four feet, and he made the comeback putt.
“If it would have happened at another tournament,” he said, “I could have potentially lost my mind there a little bit. But I felt like I kept things together very well.”
If there was such a thing as a good double-bogey, this may have been it. He got unlucky on four of those six shots.
But that’s the bad news. The good news is that afterwards, Viktor talked about the mindset that carried him through, and helped him card a two-under 68 anyway.
How Hovland dealt with four unlucky break(s)
- Accept it, don’t stew
It happened. It’s annoying. Don’t linger on a sense of perceived injustice—no good can come from it.
“I told [my caddie] Shea, ‘Yeah, I just got U.S. Open’d right there,'” Hovland said. “There’s not much you can do about it.”
- Keep things in perspective
Zoom out. You’re annoyed in part because you were playing well. Remind yourself that a few unlucky breaks don’t change the bigger picture.
“I was playing really well up until that point, so you’ve just got to go back to what you were doing before,” Hovland says.
- Focus on one positive thing
Looking for the silver lining is probably the last thing you want to do, but it’s important. It gives you a sense of momentum even in the bad times. That’s what Hovland did.
“I did a good job just to get it out in the fairway…and actually made a nice two-putt for a double bogey,” Hovland said.
- Slow down
When we’re stressed, or annoyed, or angry, we tend to speed up. Take a minute to slow down, Hovland says.
“I’ve had a couple bad holes back-to-back, I tend to rush. I tend to really get quick. Out here when the rounds are so long, you can’t really do that. As you said, you have to reset, and yeah, you might have had a bad hole on the last hole and then you’re sitting on the tee box for 10, 20 minutes. At least it gives you a good opportunity to get that out of your system and reset and think about the next shot.”
