2024 Texas Children's Houston Open: Top 10 power rankings at Memorial Park

At long last, Tony Finau gets the opportunity to defend his title at the Texas Children’s Houston Open.

He ran roughshod at Memorial Park in 2022, firing 65-62-68-69 to run away with a four-shot victory. Finau had a whopping eight-shot lead heading into the final round and had it on autopilot on Sunday to close out an impressive wire-to-wire victory.

He hit 100% of his fairways on Saturday, something he said he had never done to that point in his career.

“...it's a tough golf course to play,” Finau was transcribed by Tee Scripts in 2022. “You have to drive it in the fairway and your work's not done, it's hard to hit the greens. You know if you miss the green, it's hard to get up and down…”

A reason Finau isn’t higher on this week’s power rankings is disappointing form leading in.

The big hitter is coming off a missed cut (albeit his first of the season) last week at the Valspar Championship and owns just one top-10 in 2024 (T-6th, Farmers Insurance Open).

Finau ranks 10th on the PGA Tour in Strokes Gained: Approach (.725) and 19th in SG: Off-the-Tee (.931). He can absolutely rip a golf club, ranking fifth in club head speed (132.93 miles per hour).

Finau is a great mid to long-iron player. He sits first in average approach proximity from 200-225 yards (27’8”) and is 11th on approaches of 200-plus (45’9”).

While he’s probably not having the year so far that Finau envisioned, he’s ever the optimist. All it takes is one week to snap out of it. Why not at the site of past success?