Davis earns 1st PGA Tour win in five-hole playoff

LOS ANGELES — Adam Scott has another victory at Riviera, and this time it counts. Scott survived a calamitous Sunday with just enough clutch putts — for birdie, par, even a bogey — and closed with 1-under 70 for a two-shot victory in the Genesis Invitational. Related: Leaderboard | Scott starves himself of competition to stay hungry The victory comes 15 years after Scott won a playoff at Riviera that didn’t count as official because rain shortened the tournament to 36 holes. He earned every bit of this victory, his 14th on the PGA TOUR and 29th worldwide. Nearly a dozen players had a chance to win. Five players had a share of the lead at some point. Riviera was such a strong test that everyone made mistakes, including Scott. He went long off the fifth green, had a flop shot come back to his feet, putted the next up the hill and made double bogey. But he bounced back with a slick, scary 18-foot birdie putt on the par-3 sixth to regain a share of the lead, and he never trailed the rest of the way. Rory McIlroy was tied for the lead when he went long on the fifth, took two flop shots to get on the green and then compounded the error with a three-putt triple bogey. McIlroy never recovered. His tee shot on the par-3 sixth went on the wrong side of the bunker in the middle of the green, leading to another bogey. He closed with a 73 and tied for fifth. Harold Varner III, looking for his first PGA TOUR victory, was tied for the lead until he tried to hammer a 3-wood on the reachable 10th hole and chunked it so bad it barely reached the fairway, traveling a mere 129 yards. That led to double bogey, and he made bogey on the par-5 11th to fall out of contention. His day ended by missing a 3-foot par putt that gave him a 74 to finish out of the top 10. Tiger Woods had his problems, too, but he was never in contention. Woods played a five-hole stretch late in his round at 5 over and shot 77 to finish last among the 68 players who made the cut. It was the first time Woods has finished last alone since the Memorial in 2015. “Good news, I hit every ball forward, not backwards, a couple sideways,” Woods said. Matt Kuchar, who started the final round tied with Scott and McIlroy, birdied the par-5 opening hole and didn’t make another until the 17th when it was too late. He shot 72 and tied for second with Sung Kang (69) and Scott Brown (68). The clincher for Scott was his 10-foot birdie putt on the par-5 17th that gave him a two-shot margin, and when he knocked in his par putt on the 18th, he stood back and thrust his right fist in the air.  Scott finished at 11-under 273 for his first PGA TOUR title since the World Golf Championships event at Doral in 2016. “I’m stoked with this,” Scott said. “It’s a big step, whatever point in my career I’m at. I haven’t won for three years. This feels very special.” It was his second straight victory — he last played three days before Christmas and won the Australian PGA — and takes him to 16th in the FedExCup standings.  Hideki Matsuyama made the cut on the number and finished three shots behind in a tie for fifth with McIlroy, Bryson DeChambeau, Max Homa and Joel Dahmen. Homa and Dahmen were in the mix late, but Homa caught a plugged lie in the bunker on the par-3 16th and made bogey to stop his threat, and Dahmen missed the 18th green to the left and failed to save par. Scott saved par on No. 12 with a 10-foot putt. He seized control with a 12-foot birdie putt on the 13th. And when he got in big trouble with his approach into a buried lie in the sand on the 15th, he got up-and-down from the other side of the green with a 5-foot putt to escape with bogey. This was a long time coming on the PGA TOUR, and it came on his favorite course on the PGA TOUR.

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Nate Lashley feels good at Corales Golf Course. He proved that Saturday. Lashley, who won the 2017 Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship when it was a Korn Ferry Tour event, fired a bogey-free 7-under-par 65 Saturday to move into the top five late in the afternoon. He's looking for his second PGA TOUR win after capturing the Rocket Mortgage Classic last summer. "Anytime you win a tournament on a course, you feel comfortable, you feel confident," said Lashley. "It’s one of those courses that is kind of a second-shot course and I feel like that’s a strength of my game, getting on the green and making some putts." RELATED: Leaderboard | O’Hair off to strong start after ‘really hard recovery’ Lashley said Saturday's 65 was solid from tee-to-green. He's now in a position to recreate some magic from three years ago in the final round. "It’s just one of those rounds you come out, it’s the way you want to play," he said. "You want to hit fairways, get it on the green and when you have chances, make the birdies putts and I did that today. "When I’m hitting my irons well, I feel like on a course like this I’m going to have a chance to finish well." Lashley made a key par save on the difficult par-4 18th. The tee was all the way back for the third round and the hole, a dogleg right around the ocean, measured 501 yards on the card. Lashley tried to hit his drive over the fairway bunker and ended up with a poor lie and had to punch up to the green. He made an 18-foot putt to save par. Lashley was 5-for-5 in scrambling on the day, which he said was another important factor for him moving up the leaderboard Saturday. "When you can get up and down and save those pars or save the birdies when you’re up around par 5s, that’s huge. That’s where you turn in a 7-under round or go to a 3- or 4-under round. That’s a big difference when you get up and down 5 out of 5 times," said Lashley. "So that’s when you have some great scores and hopefully can continue that tomorrow." Fellow Corales winners Dominic Bozzelli and Brice Garnett also found the weekend. Garnett sits at 4-under through three rounds. Bozzelli was inside the top-15 on the leaderboard before three-putting the 18th green to finish at 1-under for the day. Bozzelli is 8-under for the tournament.

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