Patrick Cantlay rallied from four shots behind and got far enough ahead that Jon Rahm and Justin Thomas couldn’t quite catch him Sunday in the Zozo Championship at Sherwood.
Cantlay closed with a 7-under-par 65 for a one-shot victory, the third of his career, and first in his home state of California. All three required making up a deficit of three shots or more.
As much as Cantlay celebrated a victory he felt was overdue, Rahm and Thomas were left to rue their mistakes.
Rahm took the lead with a birdie on the par-5 11th, only to drop shots on each of the next two holes, including the par-5 13th. The Spaniard had a chance to force a playoff, but narrowly missed from 15 feet on the par-3 17th and from 20 feet on the final hole. He shot 68.
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Thomas, who started the round with a one-shot lead, had to scramble for par on the last two par 5s, and hit into hazards on consecutive holes down the stretch. His tee shot to a front pin on the par-3 15th plugged into thick grass, and Thomas did remarkably well to hack out to 30 feet and make bogey.
Cantlay, in the group ahead of Thomas and Rahm, bungled the par-5 16th by missing the green from 114 yards and making only his second bogey of the round, and the tournament. That reduced his lead to two shots.
Thomas drilled a drive and was in perfect position with a 4-iron. But he sent that out to the right, trying to avoid a shot left of the green, and it bounced off a tree and into the creek. After the penalty drop, he had to play a marvelous pitch-and-run off hard pan to get up-and-down for par.
But he needed birdies, and that didn’t come for Thomas until he needed to hole out from the 18th fairway for eagle. His approach landed 4 feet next to the hole. The birdie gave him a 69, and denied Rahm a small consolation. Rahm needed to finish second alone to return to No. 1 in the world.
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Dustin Johnson, a Sherwood member who missed this week recovering from a positive coronavirus test, remains No. 1.
Cantlay moved back into the top 10. He has no weakness in his game except for the victory tally. Cantlay had gone more than a year since his last victory, when he rallied from three behind at Muirfield Village to win the Memorial. His other win was in Las Vegas in 2017 when he came from four shots back and won in a playoff.
At a tournament with low scoring, he had no choice but to produce his best of the week. Cantlay opened with four birdies in six holes to get in the mix, and he surged into the lead with four birdies in a five-hole stretch on the front nine.
The final birdie was the toughest, a 7-iron he hit at three-quarter speed that landed right next to the hole and rolled out to 10 feet for his third straight birdie.
Thomas and Rahm provided some help on the par-5 13th. Thomas went from thick rough to more thick rough and still had 189 yards for his third shot, and he ended up making a tough par save from the collection area behind the green. Rahm was in the fairway and in range, but he came up well short into a bunker, left that short of the green and missed an 8-foot par.
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No one else was within four shots of Cantlay.
The other show at Sherwood was on the opposite side of the course, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson playing together in the final round with no fans. There was nothing to see, anyway.
Woods closed with a 74 and still beat Mickelson by four shots. Mickelson, coming off a victory last week on the PGA Tour Champions, had five 6s on his card. Both finished out of the top 70 against a 78-man field.
LPGA —Ally McDonald gave herself a big birthday present, winning the LPGA Drive On Championship-Lake Reynolds Oconee for her first tour title.
The 28-year-old from Mississippi held off Danielle Kang by a stroke on the Great Waters Course, closing with a 3-under-par 69 for a 16 -under 272 total. Kang birdied the par-5 18th for a 68.
“I’ve never doubted my ability, but I’ve definitely questioned whether I would be able to win out here,” McDonald said. “It’s really hard to win out here. So, I’ve just really hung in there and tried to stick to my process since Day 1. That was able to get me in the winner’s circle today. I’m really thankful.”
McDonald birdied the first three holes on the back nine, dropped a stroke on 14, birdied 16, bogeyed 17, and parred the par-5 18th. Kang birdied Nos. 12, 13, and 14 to pull within a stroke, but bogeyed the 15th.
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“I’m not going to lie, it shook me up pretty bad,” McDonald said. “I had to gather myself and get my heart rate under control after I made bogey on 13 and Danielle went back to back on birdies on 13 and 14. I just told myself to calm down and do what I’ve been doing every single round, and that is just trying to execute my game plan, control what I can.”
Kang won back-to-back events in Ohio in the summer, leads the Race to CME Globe and, at No. 5 in the world, was the top-ranked player in the field.
“I knew from the start that Danielle was going to hang in there,” McDonald said. “You kind of go to match play mode and you think absolutely she’s going to put the pedal down. So I was just happy to hang in there and pull it out.”
McDonald’s parents watched her play during the weekend.
“It means the world to me, obviously, that they’re here,” McDonald said. “This is the closest golf tournament that we have. ... Having them here was just amazing.”
Kang played through back spasms.
“I think I just need to take a few days off right now,” Kang said. “My back has went into a spasm few days ago. I call it wifi. It’s on strong right and left. So it was a little difficult this week to play with it. I think I’m very proud of how I played despite not having my full game, but Ally played wonderfully and it’s been a really great week.”
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Bianca Pagdanganan of the Philippines was two strokes back after a 70. She was making her sixth LPGA Tour start of the year and seventh overall.
“Being at this level and just being able to compete with the greatest players, it’s so much fun,” Pagdanganan said. “I say this a lot, but I really do get to live my dream. If you told me a couple years ago that I would be playing on the LPGA Tour and in this position in my rookie year I probably wouldn’t believe you.”
Mina Harigae (67) and Carlota Ciganda (69) were 13 under, a stroke ahead of Ariya Jutanugarn (69) and Katherine Kirk (70).
European — English golfer Ross McGowan holed a bunker shot at No. 16 and rolled in a birdie at the last hole to earn a one-stroke victory at the Italian Open in Brescia, securing his first title on the European Tour in 11 years.
McGowan struggled to keep his emotions in check after the final round, after seeing playing partner Laurie Canter miss his own birdie putt on the 18th that would have forced a playoff.
“My head is going full blast at the moment,” McGowan said. "I got the ball in the hole which in the past has been my nemesis, so it was nice to be able to do that this week.
“When I hit the bunker shot on 16, that came exactly how I saw it.”
McGowan, whose only other European Tour victory was at the Madrid Masters in 2009, shot 1-under 71 to finish on 20 under overall.
Canter, another Englishman, was looking to clinch a wire-to-wire victory but shot even-par 72 — his worst score of the week. He was the only player in the top 20 to not break par on Sunday, and was tied for second place with Nicolas Colsaerts (68).
“I just need to be happy with the finish,” Canter said. “It’s a good week and I played a lot of good golf and hopefully I am going to have a long career out here. But days like that obviously hurt. I’ll need to just think for a little bit, for a day or two, and reflect on what I didn’t do today. Hopefully I can have an opportunity to put it right.”
The European Tour withdrew Joachim Hansen from the final round after the Dane’s caddie tested positive for the coronavirus.
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