It’s really unfortunate that no fans attended the PGA Championship on Sunday, as their cheers from all over TPC Harding Park would have elevated an already exceptional showdown.
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Collin Morikawa prepares for the eagle that will win him the PGA Championship. (Photo by Sean M. Haffey / Getty Images)
(Yes, it was the right and right thing to do to keep fans away from the course. We would all rather watch golf without fans than no golf at all. Just would have been fun, is all I said.)
Collin Morikawa unleashed a final round 64 to claim his first major championship – in his first major appearance as a professional – on Sunday with a performance as stable as you will ever see. He outlasted six different players tied with him at the top of the Leaderboard. He unleashed the shot of a life to put distance between himself and the field. And he remained smooth and stable as he closed the two most important holes of his life.
His only bobble …
Steady as can be with a club in his hands, not so much with a trophy … pic.twitter.com/pQP0pE9VqH
– GOLF.com (@GOLF_com) August 10, 2020
It was stellar golf, even when almost no one saw it live.
The set-up here was nothing short of exceptional: one big winner leaving too much to be desired. (Dustin Johnson), another big winner whose narrow window seems to have closed (Jason Day), a veteran who never won one of the Big Four awards (Paul Casey), the guy who won these last two months have been the center of the golf universe (Bryson DeChambeau), and a whole bunch of young players are just about to break through (Scottie Scheffler, Cameron Champ, Morikawa, Tony Finau, Matthew Wolff).
Lurking behind them all: the own Grim Reaper of golf, Brooks Koepka, the chance at favorites to win and a man who many expected could snore right through this Leaderboard like it was hot butter. Only it did not happen that way. Koepka had before him a galactic collapse, which went fourth on the top nine to dislodge himself from the tournament before he could even place the fear of God in everyone else on the Leaderboard.
Next Sunday was the main goal of the need of Koepka Johnson, who, as Koepka indicated on Saturday, had won “only one” that came that day. But it was worse than that: Sunday marked the fourth time that Dustin Johnson held at least a share of the lead that came in the final day of a major, the previous times were the 2010, 2015 and 2018 US Opens. He won just zero of those, making him the fifth player to start 0-for-3 in majors in which he had a final day lead. No player had finally reached 0-4.
Unlike many of those other majors, DJ did not implode into the opening holes, or even the top nine. He calmed down calmly a one-under first nine, and made up his only bogey with a straight birdie, making the innings appear in good shape to hit right after that oh-so-hard second major.
There was only one problem: no one else flinched, either. When Johnson made the innings, 12 players were within two shots of the lead.
Wolff hit the clubhouse shortly before 7:30 Eastern, finishing with a 65 to put the initial bar at -10. Shortly thereafter, six more players stood on that mark – seven players, tied for the lead, with less than seven holes left in the tournament. Joff at Wolff at the top were Johnson, Morikawa, Casey, Day, Finau and Scheffler, with DeChambeau one stroke behind.
And then the trickiness began. Hold on tight, this is where it gets chaotic.
Morikawa, who won the very first PGA Tour tournament he played as a professional, began to put distance between himself and the field when he chipped in at 14 to get to -11 and the solo lead.
The shot of the tournament so far!
Collin Morikawa leads by ☝️ pic.twitter.com/2egm1a9DpS
Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) August 10, 2020
A few minutes later, Casey 16 struck out to climb into a tire for the lead. Scheffler dropped off the pace, but DeChambeau cleared his way to -10. Day ended at -10, tied for the clubhouse lead at the time. Meanwhile, Johnson struck 14 to drop two strokes back. One abuse, that’s all it takes.
Morikawa, all 23 years old, then let loose a brilliant tea shot at 16 that left a short noble putt. He turned it around to take a two-shot lead over Casey at -13 with two holes to play.
Can not. Hold up. View. pic.twitter.com/oDxiLog4rA
– GOLF.com (@GOLF_com) August 10, 2020
DeChambeau and Finau then grabbed at -10, and Morikawa missed by two revolutions of the ball a birdie pits that would have hammered the door. Casey, meanwhile, who holds the record for most big starts without a win – 64 – finished at -11 to eliminate all players at -10.
Johnson tried to fight his way back, to chip in 16 hours from the edge – this is again where the crowd came in handy – but he had only two holes left to make three counts, a hole that he could not close.
That left Morikawa alone at the top, one of the youngest big winners in golf history. He was all two months old when Tiger Woods won his first major, at Augusta. And now he’s embarking on a journey that looks incredibly bright.
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter at @jaybusbee or contact him with tips and story ideas at [email protected].
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