Atlanta Drive GC downed New York Golf Club in the inaugural TGL presented by SoFi season and took home the SoFi Cup in the process.

Before the season, Atlanta was not the team with the highest-ranked players in the Official World Golf Rankings (that was Boston Common Golf with an average OWGR of 9.8 across its four players), nor was Atlanta the team favored by oddsmakers (that was LAGC, who were favorites at +340 before the season).

So how and why did Atlanta Drive go 7-1 on the year (across regular season and playoffs) en route to the SoFi Cup?

1. The best ball strikers (almost) always win

The simplest way I can say this is that nobody in the league hit their irons better than Atlanta Drive. Going into the Finals, Atlanta Drive led the league in strokes gained on approach shots per match at +2.52.

Many people think putting is the most important factor driving wins in golf. And while it is very important, across the arc of a season – even a short season like TGL – the team with the best iron players is definitely going to be competitive and is likely going to win. That’s exactly how it played out with Atlanta Drive.

2. Hammer strategy

I’m not sure I saw any team think about strategy as much as Atlanta Drive. Patrick Cantlay credited team manager, Ben Helmrath, on the strategic side, but Cantlay was involved as well. Justin Thomas and Billy Horschel mentioned multiple times throughout the year that they were just doing as Cantlay instructed.

This led to a great moment in the Finals when Atlanta Drive used the Hammer perfectly on three consecutive holes in Match 2, including the par-4 13th, which was the best usage of the Hammer we'd seen all year.

“You can only really use the Hammer when you get up in holes,” explained Cantlay afterwards. “We didn't get up in very many holes until the end, and we obviously needed to throw them before we got to the end of the match; you can't leave Hammers in your pocket preferably.

“So when we got up in those holes coming down the stretch, we threw the hammer I think at the right time and got a couple concessions and got us back in the match, and obviously when Billy makes every putt he hits for two points, that's pretty helpful.”

This sounds simple, but it’s not. During the season, less-strategically savvy teams used their Hammers when they were obviously already going to win a hole, which is a waste. Atlanta Drive used them when they were 60/40 to win a hole, which is perfect. It left doubt in the opposing team - should they accept or decline - and led to double-up opportunities.

The way Atlanta clinched the SoFi Cup was a Hammer strategy clinic.

3. Justin Thomas On the Green

We’ll get to Horschel, but can we talk about Thomas first?

J.T. tied Rickie Fowler among all eight players on either team in the Finals with an average made putt of 9.1 feet. He also led the league in 10-30 foot putts made throughout the regular season.

Almost every time Atlanta Drive needed a putt, J.T. stepped up. And when he didn’t, there was Horschel to pick him up.

4. Singles Domination

Speaking of Horschel, he led a team that totally dominated Singles throughout the year. In the regular season, Atlanta Drive won 18 singles points. Los Angeles Golf Club was second with 15. No other team cleared 10.

In the playoffs, the contrast was even more stark. Atlanta Drive won 13 points in Singles across three matches – often on Hammer throws. NYGC came in second with seven. LAGC was third with just two.

Horschel was the star. He led all players in the regular season with eight points won in Singles (Keegan Bradley and Wyndham Clark were second with five apiece). Horschel also tied Cantlay with five points won in playoff Singles.

“Billy is a dog,” said Xander Schauffele after his NYGC team lost to Atlanta Drive in the Finals. “He made some really big putts when he needed to.”

5. Team Chemistry

Atlanta Drive found a trio in Thomas, Cantlay and Horschel that truly worked, and they largely stuck with it throughout the season.

It meant that Lucas Glover was often the odd man out. He played in just two matches all season, but when he played, he was great. There were jokes after the championship that his season-long number of 100% of fairways hit will never be broken in TGL history.

So why did Thomas, Cantlay and Horschel work so well together? Here’s a great example from the Finals on Tuesday: On the 14th hole of the final match of the season, Thomas assisted Horschel on the putt of the year.

“I like finding the fall line, feel like I can do it decently well,” said Thomas after the match. “I told Billy there was a piece of sand that I used for reference, and somehow that piece of sand was still there, and I hit mine a little harder than I wanted, and it obviously was high. So I was like, 'Billy, here's the piece of sand, this is the fall line', and I was like, 'I'm just going from experience of what happened to me a couple holes ago.'”

That’s a small thing, but it was a meaningful one. Horschel was the hype, Cantlay the strategic steady hand, and Thomas the glue that brought it together.

Kyle Porter wrote close to 3 million words about golf over 12 years for CBS Sports and covered 47 majors and five Ryder Cups in the process. He has written three books – Normal Sport 1, 2 and 3 – and built a newsletter of 15,000 golf fans at normalsport.com.