Hannah Green can make a winning return to the scene of her finest hour and double her tally in the KPMG Women's PGA Championship.
- Nelly Korda chasing three majors wins in a row
- Hannah Green returns to scene of major breakthrough
- Jin Hee Im remains a little under-rated
Golf betting tips: KPMG Women’s PGA Championship
2pts e.w. Hannah Green at 22/1 (SpreadEx, Sporting Index 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7)
1pt e.w. Ina Yoon at 40/1 (General 1/4 1,2,3,4,5)
1pt e.w. Jin Hee Im at 50/1 (SpreadEx, Sporting Index 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7)
1pt e.w. In Gee Chun 80/1 (General 1/4 1,2,3,4,5)
The American Dave Hill was an extraordinary character. He was a 13-time PGA Tour winner and three-time Ryder Cup representative, but it was not his game that made him stand out. It was his personality.
During the 1960 Ryder Cup he came close to fisticuffs with Bernard Gallacher, and he actually did fight with both Chi Chi Rodriguez (in 1970) and JC Snead (in 1991). In-between he got into a verbal fight with the Australian Peter Thomson and a million dollar legal fight with the PGA Tour.
Shortly after the locker room scrap with Rodriguez, Hill went toe-to-toe with Tony Jacklin in the first men’s major championship to be hosted by Hazeltine National GC. The pair had form because Hill had actively made Jacklin feel unwelcome on the PGA Tour, but on that occasion it was not the Englishman that was the focus of his ire, but the course.
Asked what he thought of the layout he said: “I’m still looking for it.” And later added: “I’m a farm boy and I know a good piece of farmland when I see one. Mr Jones has ruined what could have been a fine farm.”
Ah, yes, the designer was Robert Trent Jones Sr who was, and remains, respected by many. Not Hill though. He said that he believed Jones, “had the blueprints upside down.”
Four years before Jacklin’s triumph, Hazeltine hosted the US Women’s Open, as it did again in 1977. Then, in 2019, Hannah Green won the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship there and the tournament returns to the course this week.
Nelly Korda, winner of the Chevron Championship in April and the US Women’s Open at the end of last month, finds herself on Grand Slam watch and it’s not unprecedented in recent times in the women’s game.
Back in 2013, Inbee Park mopped up the first three majors of the year and got off to a flyer on the Old Course in the Women’s Open. A handful of birdies over the first few holes and she even ducked to odds-on for the championship, but she eventually drifted outside the top 60.
Can Korda do better? There seems absolutely no reason why she won’t contend this week. After all, in eight individual starts in 2026 she has four wins and three seconds – and there’s nothing about Hazeltine to say she will be inconvenienced.
In fact, Dave Hill’s comments were rather cock-eyed because if he hated the place so much and recorded the best major championship finish of his career, what exactly is the point of liking a course?
Enough chatter, what of the picks this week? Well, we’ve dodged Korda all year and been caught out, but it will remain the strategy and we’ll kick off with the course defending champion HANNAH GREEN because she is a four-time winner this year (twice on the LPGA) and also has a fine record of repeating quality performances on courses she likes.
She was a winner at Columbia Edgewater in 2019 and finished T3 in 2022. She contended on her first start at El Caballero last year and won there this April. Her last four results at Wilshire read: T3, T2, win, win. Her entire log book at Sentosa is: second, T6, T20, win, T7 and – this March – another win.
She was T7 in the Chevron Championship in March so had major form and is available at 22/1.
We’ll add JIN HEE IM who we were keen on ahead of the US Women’s Open. Alas, she got off to a slow start, but played well at the weekend.
In two and a half years of competing in the majors she has impressed and she remains a little underrated. She was the halfway leader and T8 on her major debut in the Chevron Championship in 2024, and contended when T12 in the US Women’s Open and T10 in the Women’s Open later that year.
Last year she was the US Women’s Open first round leader, and T23 in the Women’s Open after sitting outside the top 110 after 18 holes. This year she has been T21 in the Chevron Championship and T19 in the US Women’s Open.
Earlier in the season she lost a play-off to Green at El Caballero which, like Hazeltine, is a Trent Jones design. She was T12 last week, but it is better than it first seems because she was T115 after the first round. Let’s hope she can set a solid base and make 55/1 look great value.
Next up is the 23-year-old INA YOON who’s got to grips with the LPGA this season and has also shown her good form in the majors.
Since the end of March her efforts have been very impressive: T6 at Whirlwind, T17 at Shadow Creek, T4 at El Caballero, T4 at Memorial Park in the Chevron Championship, T20 at Mountain Ridge, T12 when the first-round leader at Maketewah, and T7 last time out in the pairs event.
Her one bad week came at the US Women’s Open when a second round 79 saw her crash out, but before then she’d carded a 68 to sit T3. We’ll take the general 40/1.
We’ll complete the plan with IN GEE CHUN who briefly looked like she would nip in and win the US Women’s Open when T4 at Riviera last month. That was a reminder of her major championship quality – she’s a three-time winner and two-time runner-up.
She backed that effort up with T12 last week when a third round 65 had her fourth with 18 holes to play. That form and her ability to cope with a major test make the 80/1 well worth snapping up.
Posted at 12:45 BST on 23/06/26
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