It’s never easy to play in the afternoon of a major championship knowing that someone had posted a 9-under 63 in the morning. And it gets exponentially more difficult when you shoot 1-over in your afternoon round and leave for the day a whopping 10 shots behind.
So Maja Stark, the 2025 U.S. Women’s Open champion and 20th-ranked player in the world, puts some stock in a rather unusual philosophy.
“I don’t really have any expectations right now because it feels like it just goes better when I don’t.”
Case in point: Stark felt she hit it quite well Thursday but couldn’t buy a birdie putt and posted 73. When a few putts didn’t fall early in Round 2 Friday morning, “I felt like it was going to be another one of those days.”
Maja Stark is on the move with shots like this! 👍
— KPMG Women's PGA Championship (@KPMGWomensPGA) June 26, 2026
Watch now on @GolfChannel. #KPMGWomensPGA pic.twitter.com/YlkIyAsVU3
But then it turned into one of those days when her ball-striking brilliance took over.
The powerful Swede made a 17-footer for birdie at No. 6, then hit it to 2 ½, 6, 3, and 15 to add birdies at Nos. 8, 9, 11, and 13. After a bogey at No. 14, Stark played Hazeltine National’s signature hole, the 371-yard, par-4 16th – a splendid 263-yard tee shot into the left side of the fairway, an iron to 5 feet and a sixth birdie.
When the numbers were crunched, Stark had shot 67 to get through 36 holes in 4-under. Yes, a healthy deficit still faced her, but Stark is quite OK with the ways two days have gone.
“I think I don’t have huge misses right now and it feels like my short game and my putting are just very steady. I feel strangely calm out there.”
