Rory McIlroy looks to end great year on big note

SHANGHAI — Already the FedExCup champion and PGA TOUR Player of the Year, Rory McIlroy has found plenty of motivation toward the back end of the year. Most of it is geared toward reaping rewards next year. McIlroy is coming off a tie for third last week at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP, a tournament he was never going to win after a bad start. He still managed his 17th top-10 of the year out of 23 starts worldwide, inching a little closer to Brooks Koepka at No. 1 in the world. He is the leading figure at this week’s World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions, as Koepka and Dustin Johnson, two regulars at Sheshan International, are home in Florida recovering from knee issues. Koepka will not play another official event the rest of the year. He withdrew from the THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES in South Korea when his foot slipped on a piece of wet cement leaving a tee box and he planted hard with his left knee, which had received stem cell treatment during his offseason. He chose not to play the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas, and still to be determined is whether he plays the Presidents Cup. McIlroy has won three times in 2019, including THE PLAYERS Championship and TOUR Championship, along with runner-up finishes in two World Golf Championships. He joins Tiger Woods as the only two-time winners of the FedExCup, and could become the first player to win the Cup three times and back-to-back. “I’ve achieved most things that I’ve wanted to this year,” McIlroy said. “Just want to finish the year off strongly because I feel the year that I’ve had deserves a finish like that.” McIlroy has gone four years since capturing a World Golf Championship, though he has performed well in them this year. He was runner-up to Johnson in Mexico and Koepka in Memphis and suffered a bitter loss in the fourth round to Tiger Woods at the Dell Technologies Match Play. Xander Schauffele is the defending champion at the HSBC Champions, and he’ll try to win again without much of a voice. Schauffele got sick during the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP and withdrew from the pro-am Wednesday to try to be in fighting shape. The field also features resurgent Hideki Matsuyama, who tied for third in South Korea and was runner-up to Woods last week before a frenzied gallery in his native Japan; and Justin Rose, who also wants to finish the year strong for other reasons. They won won the HSBC in 2017 and 2018, respectively. Rose, who was No. 1 in the world for the opening two months of the year, has gone the opposite direction of McIlroy. Rose hopes to get back on track at the tournament where he rallied from eight shots behind to kick off his FedExCup-winning campaign. The HSBC Champions also is the last chance for players to audition as wild-card picks for the Presidents Cup, and most everyone on the bubble is here — Tony Finau, Patrick Reed, Kevin Kisner and Chez Reavie for the Americans, a longer list of International players from Sungjae Im and Byeong Hun An of South Korea, Adam Hadwin and Corey Conners of Canada and Justin Harding and Erik van Rooyen of South Africa. Reavie is among 18 players who have gone to all three PGA Tour events on the Asia swing.

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