Rory McIlroy aces 15th hole at Spyglass Hill in PGA Tour return

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — It took only six holes for Rory McIlroy to make a splash in his season debut on the PGA Tour.

Playing in Thursday’s first round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, McIlroy aced the par-3 15th hole at Spyglass Hill Golf Course. With just 119 yards to the hole, the world No. 3 sawed off a wedge and flew the ball straight into the cup, rattling the flagstick on its way down.

“It’s such an elevated tee that the ball’s in the air and you know it’s on line but you don’t know whether to say go or sit or spin or release or whatever,” McIlroy said. “It’s sort of weird, you’re looking at it and you’re sort of watching where it might land on the green, and the thing just disappears.”

It was the second career ace on the PGA Tour for McIlroy, who made his first during the first round of the 2023 Travelers Championship.

“Honestly, it was lucky, I don’t see many balls nowadays go straight in the hole and stay in the hole,” McIlroy said of Thursday’s ace. “Pretty fortunate because it could have come out and went back in the water or do anything. It was a good swing, good wedge shot.”

The hole-in-one pushed McIlroy — who started his round on the 10th hole — to 3-under through six holes and near the top of the leaderboard in the early stages of the tournament. He finished his round with three birdies in his final four holes for a 6-under 66 and sits two shots back of Russell Henley‘s lead.

Prior to this week, McIlroy had not played on the PGA Tour since the Tour Championship in early September. He won once on tour in 2024 and finished second to Bryson DeChambeau at the US Open.

McIlroy said Thursday he played more golf, mostly socially, than usual between the end of the 2024 season and the beginning of this one, which has helped him feel more ready than usual at this point in the year.

“I’m maybe not searching as much,” he said. “I stayed pretty busy in that October period where I did a lot of swing work. Then I also played quite a lot of golf in December, which I don’t usually play, so I felt like that kept me a little more sharp.”

The last player to ace the 15th hole at Spyglass was Justin Rose in 2023. He went on to win the tournament.

Just hours after McIlroy made his ace, Shane Lowry followed suit and made an ace of his own on Pebble Beach’s iconic par-3 7th hole. The hole was playing 113 yards Thursday and Lowry’s ball landed short of the hole and spun right into it, sending Lowry and his playing partners into celebration.

As pointed out by golf statistician Justin Ray, Lowry — who also shot 66 on Thursday — now has three career aces on tour — at TPC Sawgrass’s 17th hole, Augusta National’s 16th hole and now Pebble’s 7th.