Sunday at TPC Sawgrass was set up to go one of two ways for him Ludwig Aberg. Leading the field by three shares after 54 holes, the final round would be either crowning or disaster.
The latter has happened. So did Cameron Young.
Young started the final round on Aberg’s third and four-under, but he bogeyed the iconic par-3 17th to take a share of the lead and then made a tournament-winning par on the 18th to win the first. Players Championship Title.
It’s the biggest win of Young’s PGA Tour career and just his second win overall after his Wyndham Championship title last August.
Young closed with a four-under 68, and at 13 overall he beat Matthew Fitzpatrick by one. Aberg shot a 76 and tied for fifth.
Aberg had a three-shot lead at the end of the day over former college teammate Michael Thorbjornsen, but Thorbjornsen left contention with a quadruple-bogey 8 on the par-4 4th hole. Aberg played good but not great golf on the front nine, making a birdie and a bogey to return to even par and two shots clear of Ryder Cup teammates Robert MacIntyre and Fitzpatrick with nine to play. Young soon joined that group at the age of 11.
But things quickly changed for the leader on the back nine.
On the par-5 11th, Aberg made his first big mistake of the day, hitting his approach into the water and making bogey. As Aberg missed his first putt, Fitzpatrick, on the front par, drained his short putt to tie the lead at 12 under. On the next hole, Fitzpatrick holed it to 4 feet, birdied and took the lead alone. And at 12 things officially went sideways for Aberg. He pulled his ball into the water, missed the green with his next shot and made two-bogey, three-putting two holes.
By the end of the day it was clear that the winner would come from the penultimate pair of Fitzpatrick and Young, who had to contend not only with the watery finish of the Stadium Course, but also the increasingly strong winds.
Fitzpatrick birdied the 14th from 63 feet to bogey and share the lead with Young at 12 under, but Fitzpatrick regained the lead by making a 13-foot birdie at the 15th.
Fitzpatrick and Young shared 16, and on the iconic par-3 island-green 17th Fitzpatrick played it safe to the middle of the green and two-putted for a tie. Young took the aggressive layup, stuck it to 10 feet and rolled in the birdie putt to make it a tie at 13 under with one to play.
On 18, Young went 15 feet and made par. Fitzpatrick found the pine straw to the right of the fairway, had to punch out and then had to make an 8-footer to force a playoff, but it caught the right lip and didn’t fall.
Young walked off the green with $4.5 million – and the winner of the PGA Tour’s biggest tournament.
