For the first time in the history of the tournament, The Players Championship has itself a repeat winner.
World number 1 ranked golfer Scottie Scheffler used a blistering final round to become the event’s first back-to-back winner, carding an 8 under 64 for his final round. After starting his final round 5 strokes back of leader Xander Schauffele, Scheffler finished his round as the outright leader, but had to watch as Wyndham Clark moved to 1 stroke back with a birdie on the iconic 17th hole.
From there, Clark put his approach on 18 to within 17 feet, and had a chance to force a playoff with a make for birdie. Unfortunately, the 30 year old’s putt lipped out on the left side of the hole, crowning Scheffler as champion and putting Clark in a three way tie for 2nd place with Schauffele, and Brian Harman at 19 under.
“Pretty special,” Scheffler said when asked how it feels to be a repeat champion. “That’s something you don’t get the opportunity to do very often. It’s tough enough to win one Players.”
The 27 year old tied a TPC record for largest come from behind victory, and also became only the 4th winner to shoot 65 or better in their final round of the tournament as well. Sporting green pants for St. Patrick’s day, Scheffler found a “pot of gold” Sunday, taking home $4.5M from the $25M purse at Sawgrass.
For those keeping score at home, that brings Scheffler’s earnings to $8.5M over the last two weekends after also winning the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill in Orlando last week.
Matt Fitzpatrick of England took home 5th place to round out the top 5 turning in a final round score of 3 under par. Meanwhile Sam Ryder finished well back of the leaders at -10 for the weekend, but set a TPC record with 27 birdies over the course of his four rounds. That mark narrowly edges out Fuzzy Zoeller and Rory McIlroy’s previous tournament marks of 26.
Up next for the PGA Tour is the Valspar Championship at Innisbrook Resort in Palm Harbor, FL.
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