Canadian upstart Mackenzie Hughes showing that he belongs on the PGA Tour

When headlines and sports highlights shows trumpeted the name Mackenzie Hughes this week, most Canadian golf fans headed to the internet to find out exactly who he was.

It’s a task they’re familiar with after wearing out search engines when unheralded amateur and native son Jared du Toit took the lead at last summer’s Canadian Open.

Compared with du Toit, though, Hughes is a grizzled veteran of professional golf, with five years under his belt. Granted, almost all of that has been on golf’s minor league circuit, from the Web.com tour to the PGA Tour Canada to the Latin American circuit.

But his dominance at the RSM Classic through three rounds and his surviving the Sunday’s five-man playoff shouldn’t really have come as a surprise to those who’ve been paying attention. They wouldn’t be surprised to see the rookie emerge victorious when the playoff resumes Monday after darkness cut it short Sunday.

After all, his first few weeks on the PGA Tour have been pretty impressive.

The 25-year-old product of Dundas, Ont., got his PGA card after winning the Web.com’s Price Cutter Charity Championship in August and finishing in the top 25 on that tour’s money list with $167,369 U.S.

Since then, he’s hardly looked like the tour rookie that he is.

He started the 2016-17 season with a tie for 13th at the Safeway Open after going four-under par over the last eight holes. He followed that with a tie for 26th at the Sanderson Farms Championship.

Things didn’t go quite as well at the Shriners Hospital for Children Open (tie for 68th) or the OHL Classic at Mayakoba (failed to make the cut), but he’s turned a lot of heads with his poise and shot-making abilities this week.

In doing so, he has jumped from 1,063 to 287 in the world rankings. This week’s performance will push him up even higher.

HIs strength so far in his PGA career has been his putting. He scored 23 birdies at the Safeway Open, second in the field. At the RSM, he showed putting accuracy throughout the tournament.

But possibly his greatest asset is the ability to shake off mistakes, as he did Saturday at the RSM tournament.

Hughes is no stranger to playing under pressure, as he showed by rattling off three birds Saturday after a triple-bogey that might have sunk most golfers.

He had two pro victories to his credit prior to his PGA debut. In addition to the Price Cutter victory, he also won the PGA Tour Canada’s Cape Breton Classic in 2013.

He’s a two-time Canadian amateur champion and was part of the Canadian team that finished sixth at the world amateur team championship at 2012.

After winning a scholarship to Kent State University, he was a two-time all-Mid-American Conference team selection and was named conference freshman of the year his first season.

A graduate of Golf Canada’s development program, Hughes credits coaches Derek Ingram and Scott Cowx with sharpening his game.

“Each person who helps me knows that we only have to keep getting a little bit better each year; we’re not looking for magic ways to start lowering my scores,” he told Yahoo’s David McPherson last month. `The pieces are there and we are just trying to refine them.”

At this point, the refining program seems to be working quite well.