Maverick McNealy celebrates his 72nd birdie and first PGA Tour victory.
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It took 142 starts for the former top-ranked amateur in the world to win on the PGA Tour.
Maverick McNealy can tell you it was worth the wait.
The 29-year-old pro birdied the 72nd hole to win RSM Classic at Sea Island Golf Club in St. Louis. Simons Island, Ga., on Sunday, a victory years in the making for someone who a few years ago left Stanford for the tournament and immediately became a new household name.
He has been a full-time player on Tour for the past five years, but in that span he has only had two runner-up finishes and a third. That victory was still elusive, but he started this week’s season-ending RSM Classic with an eight-under 62 and suddenly he was right where he needed to be. He tied for the lead at 14 under heading into Sunday’s final round, still leading by one at the turn, but momentarily lost the lead on the back nine.
On the 18th, as the last still off the course, he had 5½ feet to win and he bogeyed it.
“I’ve hit a putt to win a golf tournament in my mind thousands and thousands of times,” McNealy told Golf Channel afterward. “It’s almost like deja vu sitting on top of the last one – and it turned out perfect.”
McNealy closed with a two-under 70 to finish 16 under, one ahead of a trio that included Nico Echavarria and Luke Clanton (both of whom were warming up on the court, hoping for a playoff) and playing partner Daniel Berger.
The RSM Classic, as the tournament’s finale, was the last chance for pros to break into the top 125 in the fall of the FedEx Cup and retain full membership for the following year. For players like McNealy, who was confident instead of this line, it was about moving on to enter the 2025 Signature Events and, of course, winning.
McNealy held a one-shot lead at the turn, but he missed the fairway and green on 14 and made bogey. That Nico Echavarria, who had turned 11, 13 and 15, leads solo.
Clanton added a birdie putt and big putt on 16 to tie Echavarria for the lead, and the two went into the 18th hole tied at 16 under — and then both missed the green in regulation from the fairway. Echavarria failed to get up and down and made the only bogey of the day, and Clanton, who pulled his approach into the bunker, missed his par putt on the low side. Clanton, the 21-year-old amateur, has now recorded four top 10s this season in just eight PGA Tour starts.
With Clanton and Echavarria both holding the clubhouse lead at 15 behind their Giants, suddenly a handful of others were in the mix, including McNealy and Berger, who were now tied for the lead at two for played.
Both McNealy and Berger missed birdies on 15 and 17. Then, playing the par-4 18th, Berger stuck his approach to 21 feet and McNealy holed it to 5 feet, 5 inches.
After Berger lost, McNealy found the center of the cup — and his long-awaited first PGA Tour victory.
