3M Open 2026 Review: How Jackson Koivun Won at TPC Twin Cities

Every so often a tournament rewards precisely the player its course was built for. The 3M Open at TPC Twin Cities was one of those weeks. Jackson Koivun, ranked 206th in the world with barely a handful of professional starts behind him, fired 259 to win at 25 under par, three shots clear of world number one Scottie Scheffler. The Auburn product banked $1,584,000 and a maiden PGA Tour title, and he earned it the way Blaine has always asked: with elite iron play and a hot putter.

How it was won

Koivun did not just win, he led the field in the statistic that matters most. Across the four rounds he gained 17.0 strokes on the field, the best total in the tournament and a full three clear of Scheffler's 14.0. The engine was his approach play: a field-leading 9.4 strokes gained with the irons, the single most dominant part of anyone's week. He backed it with the third-best putting week in the field (6.4 strokes gained) and the third-best greens-in-regulation rate at 84.7 per cent.

What is striking is where he did not gain. Koivun ranked 55th in the field for driving distance at 293.9 yards and actually lost 1.3 strokes around the greens, 51st in the field there. This was not a bomber overpowering a soft course. It was a precision player hitting more quality approach shots than anyone and holing his share. His scorecard read 24 birdies and two eagles against just three bogeys and no doubles across 72 holes. On a course that surrenders low numbers, he made almost no mistakes.

Did the course play to type?

In Tuesday's preview we published a course demand profile weighted putting 36 per cent, approach 31 per cent, off-the-tee 20 per cent and around-the-green 13 per cent, and we told you the top tens here are built on precision, not power. That held up. Across the actual top-ten finishers, approach and putting again accounted for roughly 70 per cent of the strokes-gained separation, with the leading tens averaging around 1.2 strokes gained per round on approach and 0.9 on the greens. Off-the-tee and short game were the minor keys, exactly as billed.

Where our profile was slightly off: we had putting as the number-one skill and approach second. The event flipped them. Approach was the biggest single driver of the leaderboard (about 40 per cent of the separation, to putting's 30), and the champion embodied that inversion. Honest scorecard, then: right on the two skills that mattered and their combined weight, a shade heavy on putting over irons. The one number that beat us was the winning score. We projected 20 under, in line with the venue's historic 20.2-under average; Koivun went five better at 25 under and Scheffler still could not catch him at 22. The projected four-under cut, by contrast, proved about right, with players sitting at two under after 36 holes heading home for the weekend.

How our picks went

No way to dress this up: it was a losing week. All four of our each-way selections came up short, and the card lost its full 8-point stake. Settled openly, in full:

• Kurt Kitayama, 1.5pt each-way at 25/1 - the defending champion and our biggest-conviction play finished T24 at 13 under, well outside the places. -3.0 pts.
• Max Homa, 1pt each-way at 45/1 - missed the cut at four over. -2.0 pts.
• Mac Meissner, 1pt each-way at 45/1 - missed the cut at two under. -2.0 pts.
• William Mouw, 0.5pt each-way at 60/1 - missed the cut at two under. -1.0 pts.

That is -8.0 points on the week, and it is the fifth straight losing card since the US Open. The tipster record now reads +51.6 points across 11 settled events, a return on investment of 58.7 per cent, with one win, eight places and 35 losses from 44 picks. We were up 85 points after Shinnecock, so this cold run has cost real ground. The staking plan and the process are unchanged: a card built on positive model-versus-market edges will have barren spells, and we will not chase.

The one that got away

The uncomfortable footnote is that we had the winner flagged. Our public Power Rankings placed Koivun third in the field, on his Statz Rankings position and red-hot recent form. The betting preview noted him too: second in the field on last-16 form and available inside 33/1. But we passed, because his three-start professional sample was too thin to stake with conviction. That is a defensible process call on any normal week. This week the low-probability side of the coin landed and a genuine talent broke through. We keep the discipline, and we tip our hat.

Two other reads are worth owning. Scheffler was our model's number one but at a fair price with no betting value, so we left him alone; he duly finished second, the market correct and our no-bet correct. And Homa, whom the Power Index actually left out of its top ten (docked for a slipping world ranking and for skipping this venue in each of the last two years), was the one our betting model liked most on course fit. This week the public numbers read him better than the model did.

What it means

Koivun is the story of the summer's middle stretch: a player who was outside the world's top 200 and is now a Tour winner, having produced the best ball-striking week of anyone in a strong field. His Statz Rankings position, which we quoted at 23rd in this field before the event, will climb as the Statz Rankings recompute on our field-adjusted strokes-gained model. Watch, too, for the honourable mentions who go under the radar: Hideki Matsuyama and Brian Harman shared third at 20 under, and 2023 champion Lee Hodges confirmed his liking for the place with a T20.

The Tour stays in the Midwest. Next up is the Rocket Classic at Detroit Golf Club, another scoreable stop where the birdie-makers thrive. Our full data-backed preview and picks are live now: read the Rocket Classic betting preview, dig into the field on the Statz projections, and check who is heating up on trending form. After five lean weeks, we are due.