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OAKMONT, Pa. -- On Thursday night, Texas Longhorn amateur Scottie Scheffler had a confession. He'd rushed a putt on Thursday afternoon before the weather horn blew for the third time because he wanted to stay up late and watch the Cavs-Warriors NBA Finals game.

"I tapped in like a 2-and-a-half footer kind of quickly, which maybe wasn't the smartest idea," said Scheffler. "I wanted our group to get done so we didn't have to come back in the morning because we were up at 4 a.m. this morning. Some rest would be good tonight, and honestly, I really wanted to watch the basketball game tonight. I wanted to get done so I could stay up late to watch that."

As it turns out, Scheffler could have watched the game, broken down the film into the wee hours of Friday morning, watched a replay of the game and given Steph Curry a shooting lesson on Friday because there wasn't any golf at all for him to play as it turns out.

Scheffler, who shot 1-under 69 in Round 1, teed off early on Thursday and was supposed to tee off late in Round 2 (Friday afternoon). But when rain knocked most of Round 1 into Friday (Scheffler was one of nine players to finish his round Thursday), those scheduled to play late on Friday (like Scheffler) got their tee times pushed all the way to Saturday morning. First round leader Andrew Landry came out, hit a single birdie putt to get to 4 under and put his clubs away for the day.

Bubba Watson, who shot 1-under 69, basically got a Friday off and decided to take Jason Day's kid, Dash, to the movies (while daddy Jason was playing 36 holes).

Meanwhile, players who sat out Thursday (the late Round 1 wave) had to play 36 holes on Friday. That includes names like Day, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson, who were supposed to play on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning but saw everything get condensed into one massive 36-hole day on a now-heating-up Oakmont.

So who got the better deal? The stop-and-start early Thursday players who finished up on Friday morning but mostly got the day off? Or the grinders who had to punch out 36 holes on Friday? That's still to be determined since the players who will finish Round 2 on Saturday and make the cut will have to turn around and play 18 more for Round 3.

"It's going to be tough out there," said Rory McIlroy, who played 14 holes Thursday, four Friday and will play Round 2 on Saturday. "Thirty-six holes around this place with the heavy grind and stuff, it's going to be quite tiring for the guys. But they're getting a golf course that's very soft. Even though they haven't seen the golf course like this either, they'll get a good feel for it and be able to get back out there straight away again today."

They did get an easier golf course on Friday, that's for sure.

So the U.S. Open has been made more difficult for pretty much everyone involved, which is unfortunate because U.S. Opens don't need to be more difficult than they already are. As I noted, it remains to be seen which players got the lucky draw, but at the moment, it appears the answer to that is "none of them." Such is life at Oakmont. You tread water, literally and figuratively this year, and you get to hoist a trophy.

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Phil Mickelson goes 36 holes on Friday. USATSI