OWGR: Top 50 finalized ahead of Masters; Rory moves to No. 2, JT out of top 10

With Week 12’s Official World Golf Ranking, the field is all but set for the first major of the year as all eyes turn to Augusta for the next two weeks (can’t forget about the Augusta National Women’s Amateur!).

Yes, there’s still the matter of the Valero Texas Open, whose winner will earn the last Masters invite (one Rickie Fowler is hoping it’s him), but the top 50 and all other avenues are signed, sealed, delivered, with 89 players (soon to be 90) set to contend for the green jacket.

As it happened, only four players qualified to Augusta by criteria No. 19 – the top 50 in the OWGR published the week prior to the Masters – alone. Those players are Jason Day, Harris English, Min Woo Lee and Keith Mitchell.

Day is the highest ranked of the four who got in on current rank alone; the Aussie is No. 33 in the world – up from 37 after a T-5 finish at the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play last weekend.

Less important this week (but still notable), Rory McIlroy jumped Jon Rahm to move to No. 2 as the two and Scheffler continue what has been a fun game of musical chairs for the top three spots this year. While McIlroy can’t usurp Scheffler for the top spot this week or next, it’s surely a consolation *wink wink* that he beat the current world No. 1 to finish solo 3rd in Austin.

The only other movement in the top 10 saw Match Play winner Sam Burns jump to No. 10 from 15. Burns knocked Justin Thomas out of the top 10 to No. 11, which marks the first time since August 2017 that JT hasn’t been among the 10 best players in the world, according to Twitter’s resident OWGR guru Nosferatu. That’s a 293-week streak lost because JT opted not to play in Austin. C’est la vie.

Outside of the top 100, Englishman Matt Wallace jumped from No. 175 to No. 117 after notching his first Tour win at the Corales Puntacana Championship. That win doesn’t get him a Masters invite, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction to potentially qualify next year.

You can see the latest Masters field here.