Mexian Abraham Ancer may have enjoyed a comfortable five-stroke lead overnight, but his final round was anything but that as he struggled only to come up trumps in a playoff with Cameron Smith and Paul Casey.
Slightly further down the leaderboard, Graeme McDowell closed out with a three-under 67 to climb into a tie for eighth place, which, following his fifth-place finish in Las Vegas two events previous, means he’s now top-10’d twice in three events having been yet to feature in both previous seasons.
And it could have been even better for the Portrush man who’d birdied three and eagled one of his first 14 holes to make it to -12, a shot shy of the eventual mark that Ancer, Smith and Casey would all finish on. Back-to-back bogeys on 18 and one – his 15th and 16th holes – ended chances of victory, but he continues to reward captain Brooks Koepka for offering him a lifeline as his future was up in the air after an underwhelming two seasons as part of the Cleeks team.
Ancer had hit all 18 greens in round two to make it to -15 with 18 holes to go, but dropped shots on the fifth and eighth holes and with blood in the water, the sharks were circling. Both Smith and Casey went bogey free, the former shooting a four-under 66 while the latter’s 64 included a holed bunker shot on his final hole to force his way into the playoff.
With the victory that seemed inevitable at the start of the day now odds against, it was as though Ancer was factory reset before the playoff, piping a beautiful draw down the fairway at the narrow 18th as Smith found the left half of the fairway and Casey blasted well right and was forced to layup short of the pond and hope to get up-and-down for par.
Smith, who’d been where Casey was in regulation and got up-and-down from 108 yards to get in at -13, was the clear favourite now, but his approach was weak, missing short right and finding the sand, clearing the stage for Ancer. As shaky as he’d looked for his previous 18 holes, he was suddenly back to the man that had put on an iron-play clinic in rounds one and two as he stuffed his approach to three feet.
Casey then came up short, leaving a 25-footer that he knew he’d have to make, and Smith found that his ball had plugged in the sand and couldn’t get inside Casey. When both men missed their lengthy par putts, Ancer had the luxury of two putts for victory, but he’d only need one, claiming his sixth professional victory and first on the LIV circuit.
“I knew it was not going to be easy,” said a relieved Ancer after holing the winning putt. “I had to obviously hit the ball the way I hit the ball the first two days to maybe say easy, but it was never going to be like that. It was tough. The rain was on and off. It was a little chilly.
“I thought the golf course played a lot tougher than it did in the first two rounds. The pin placements were really tough, as well. I mean, definitely it was not easy. That was a very stressful round.”
Casey’s final round of six-under was the main driving force as the Crushers GC made it back-to-back team victories, their -14 Sunday tally taking them to -35 overall, two clear of Torque GC with Smith’s Ripper GC one further back.
Torque captain Joaquin Niemann, who was hoping to make it three wins in four starts, came charging up the leaderboard and almost pulled it off, finishing solo fourth at -12, one back. His round included seven birdies, a bogey, and a hole-in-one on the eighth, meaning he now has the holy trinity of a win, a hole-in-one and a 59 on the LIV circuit.
In his sixth competitive round in 12 years, Anthony Kim definitely began seeing light in the tunnel and the once-phenom made seven birdies enroute to a five-under 65 which lifted him into solo 50th, finishing ahead of Jason Kokrak, Hudson Swafford, Phil Mickelson and Kieran Vincent.
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