Star group of Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy, Jordan Spieth crashes at Shinnecock

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PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Webb Simpson has completed his career resurrection in style by dominating THE PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass. Simpson – a former U.S. Open champion who has spent three years reinventing himself after the anchor putting ban – claimed his fifth PGA TOUR win by four shots after a 1-over 73 final round. “It’s been a long time. We did it,â€� Simpson said as he embraced his wife Dowd on the final green. It left him 18 under for the tournament to be four shots clear of Charl Schwartzel (67), Jimmy Walker (67) and PGA TOUR Rookie of the Year Xander Schauffele (67) who tied for second place at 14 under. Such was Simpson’s dominance that he was able to hook his approach on the 72nd hole into the water, make a double bogey, and still finish well clear. Jason Day – winner of last week’s Wells Fargo Championship – continued his good form to card a final round 68 to be tied fifth with Jason Dufner (68) at 13-under. It is Simpson’s first win since taking out the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in Las Vegas in October 2013. The win is projecting the 32-year-old to eighth place in the FedExCup and inside the top 25 players of the world rankings. Simpson also becomes the ninth player to have won THE PLAYERS and a U.S. Open with the victory making him World Golf Hall of Fame eligible in the future. Along the way he equaled the course record with his second round 63, and also the 36 and 54-hole PLAYERS scoring records at 15-under 129 and 19-under 197 respectively. Despite making the cut on the number Tiger Woods moved as close as four shots behind during Sunday’s round and into a tie for second. But a costly double bogey on the island par-3 17th hole dropped him back down the leaderboard and his 3-under 69 left him tied for 11th. “I played so well this weekend unfortunately just didn’t cash it in,â€� Woods said. Earlier Brooks Koepka had equaled the course record with a 9-under 63, a round that included an albatross with a 6-iron from 208-yards on the par-5 16th hole. FedExCup leader Justin Thomas is projected to move to world No. 1 after closing with a 6-under 66 to finish in a tie for 11th. He takes over from Dustin Johnson who had held the position from February 2017 for a total of 64 weeks – but struggled to a Sunday 72 to finish tied 17th.

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AUGUSTA, Ga. — Even without spectators in November, the Masters Tournament promised to deliver more drama with 10 players separated by a single shot going into a weekend filled with possibilities. And then Dustin Johnson turned it into a one-man show. RELATED: Leaderboard | Rory finding his stride | DeChambeau battles dizziness to make cut The reigning FedExCup champion looked every bit the part Saturday, racing away from a five-way share of the lead with an explosive start — 4 under through four holes — and never letting his foot off the gas until he had a 7-under 65 and matched the 54-hole Masters record. More importantly, Johnson had a four-shot lead. Sunday will be the third time Johnson takes a solo lead into the final round of a major, along with two other majors where he was tied for the lead. His only major was the 2016 U.S. Open when he came from behind. Most recently, he had a one-shot lead at Harding Park in the PGA Championship this summer, closed with a 68 and lost to a 64 by Collin Morikawa. This effort was master class. Johnson used putter from above a slope to the right of the 18th green to 5 feet and holed that for a par to cap off another bogey-free round and reach 16-under 200. That ties the record set by Jordan Spieth in 2015, when he went on to a four-shot victory over Justin Rose and Phil Mickelson. Not all the players chasing Johnson are as familiar. Two of them are Masters rookies. Sungjae Im, the supreme ball-striker from South Korea who won his first PGA TOUR title two weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down golf in the spring, birdied the last hole for 68. Abraham Ancer of Mexico saved par on the 18th for a 69. They were at 12-under 204, along with Cameron Smith of Australia. Smith opened with 12 pars before running off three straight birdies and scrambling his way home to a 69. Justin Thomas and Jon Rahm had their chances only to make untimely mistakes. Rahm nearly topped his second shot on the par-5 eighth and hit his next one off a tree and into the bushes on his way to a double bogey. Thomas sailed his second shot over the 15th green and into the water, making bogey on a par 5 where he was hoping to make up ground. Both bogeyed the 18th hole. Thomas shot 71, Rahm had a 72. Asked to describe his day, Rahm didn’t mince words. "Seriously? How would I describe? Pretty awful," he said. Defending champion Tiger Woods will stick around Sunday to present the green jacket, and he’ll have to leave his at Augusta National until he returns. Woods was 4 under through 10 holes to start the Masters, and he picked up only one more shot over the next 44 holes. He finished off a 71 in the second round, had a 72 in the third round and was 11 shots behind. It likely didn’t help the 44-year-old Woods to go 26 holes on soft turf of a hilly course, "It’s just part of the deal," he said. "If you have long days like this, I’m going to get a little bit sore, which I definitely am." U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau was more dizzy than sore. He felt so odd on Thursday night that he had another COVID-19 test to be sure — it came back negative — and the betting favorite of this Masters was in the middle of the pack. The scoring has been low all week. The 36-hole cut Saturday morning was at even-par 144, the lowest in Masters history, another update to the club’s record book. Still in front of Johnson is a chance to set the 72-hole record. All he cares about is a green jacket, and given his past experience, he knows better than to look ahead. "I feel like I’m swinging well and I’ve got a lot of confidence in what I’m doing. Everything is going well," he said. "There’s a lot of really good players right around me. I’m going to have play aggressive when I can and play smart when I can’t.” He was aggressive at the start. First, he drilled a 5-iron he nearly holed for an albatross on the par-5 second, leaving him a tap-in eagle. He followed that with a lofted pitch to 5 feet for birdie on No. 3, and a 40-foot birdie putt up the slope on the par-3 fourth hole as the lead began to grow. Thomas was within two shots until he made mistakes and Johnson kept going. Johnson had two-putt birdies on the par 5s on the back nine, and he hasn’t made a bogey since the sixth hole of his second round.

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