It’s been a long time since Cameron Young has won a golf tournament, so it’s poetic that a long trip to the Middle East for the Dubai Desert Classic could produce a long-overdue victory. Not since May 2021 has Young entered the winner’s circle; he did so in back-to-back weeks on the Korn Ferry Tour. Young came away from those 14 days with a pair of trophies in one hand and the confidence to compete at golf’s highest stage in the other.
Young’s belief has not waned, but it has been tested and it will continue to be this weekend at Emirates Golf Club, where he takes a three-stroke lead over Adrian Meronk and Andy Sullivan into the last two days. The final 36 holes have all the makings of a European coronation for the former PGA Tour Rookie of the Year. No one else in the field is within five strokes of the head man. Pre-tournament favorite Rory McIlroy is a full 10 strokes adrift and last week’s winner, Tommy Fleetwood, sits eight back. Young stands tall at 13 under after catching fire with 13 birdies and an eagle against just one dropped shot across his last 27 holes.
The Dubai Desert Classic may not be a PGA Tour tournament, but it is no less an important one, especially for a player like Young, whose shadow of doubt becomes longer the longer he remains without a win.
“I’m doing a really good job of doing just what you said, staying out of my own way. Kind of realized it was going well early but the back nine, at the same time, it feels like you should do that [make birdies] to some extent, especially in the morning with not much wind,” said Young. “So yeah, I feel like the back nine, I just playing really solidly, and then made a putt on 1. Made a putt on 4, and all of a sudden, that was the heat or something. Just one of those days that they kept kind of going in, and I didn’t make too many mistakes.”
To be fair, the Bronx bomber has done everything but win in his first two seasons on the PGA Tour. His rookie campaign produced heightened expectations, just not a trophy. That’s what happens when you claim seven podium finishes throughout the year at tournaments like the Genesis Invitational, PGA Championship and The Open. People assume a Year 2 leap is coming, but instead of jumping, Young went slumping.
It’s all relative, of course. Young’s trip to the Middle East in 2023 came with a runner-up performance at the Saudi International. His spring was solid — real solid — and saw the long-hitting right hander finish inside the top 20 at Riviera and inside the top 10 at Bay Hill before losing to Sam Burns in the championship match of the WGC-Dell Match Play. With new bagman Paul Tesori by his side, Young contended at the Masters.
Here we go again, or so we thought. Young’s summer was mundane as he struggled on the greens. Still, there he was at The Open with eventual champion Brian Harman in the final game Sunday. An omission from the Tour Championship and the U.S. Ryder Cup team, the 26-year-old came into 2024 as somewhat of a forgotten man — despite a pair of major top 10s — and without Tesori as his caddie made a speedy move to veteran Brendon Todd’s side.
“I think, for a while, I was all out [of patience]; I didn’t have much patience left,” Young said in November at the World Wide Technology Championship. “I think I’ve kind of come to terms with the fact that I’ve played plenty of golf that’s worthy of winning a golf tournament out here. Obviously, it hasn’t worked out that way yet, but I think I’ve played plenty of good golf, and I fully believe that that golf can win a tournament out here. So, I’ve let go of it a little bit, and I’m much more focused on trying to get better as much as I can.”
Young’s game is good enough to win a golf tournament. That has never been in doubt. Hell, it’s good enough to win a major championship and one could argue he should already have one, but this weekend in Dubai isn’t about Young’s physical game. It’s about those intangibles — his confidence, his patience and his belief.
All of those are tested when you haven’t won a golf tournament in nearly three years, so what’s a couple more days?