The PGA Tour announced Monday that Will Gordon and Erik van Rooyen have earned PGA Tour membership next season.
Gordon, 23, competed this year without any status on a major circuit after Canada’s Mackenzie Tour was canceled for the summer. The former SEC Player of the Year contended at the Travelers Championship, ultimately finishing T-3. Coupled with a T-10 at the fall’s RSM Classic and three other top-30 finishes—including at T-27 at the regular-season finale Wyndham Championship—Gordon has punched his ticket to the show.
As for van Rooyen, the South African already had job security thanks to his win at last year’s Scandinavian Invitation on the European Tour. But van Rooyen, 30, made a PGA Tour push starting at Feburary’s Genesis Invitational, and though he missed the cut in five of 11 starts, he made the most of the weekends he did make, highlighted by a T-3 at the WGC-Mexico Championship and a T-20 at the WGC-FedEx St. Jude.
As non-members competing on tour this season, neither gained entry into the FedEx Cup Playoffs (which can only be done by non-members through a win). However, Gordon and van Rooyen should consider themselves lucky. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, there is no relegation or loss of status to tour pros falling outside the FedEx Cup top 125, the upshot meaning the elimination of Korn Ferry graduates for 2020-’21.
The 2020 FedEx Cup Playoffs begin this week at the Northern Trust at TPC Boston.