Tiger Woods returns with a flourish, shoots 64 and leads Zozo Championship

Cutting through a crowded leaderboard, Rory McIlroy birdies five of his last six holes to post a final-round 64 and resume his winning ways after an 18-month dry spell. Welcome to the Monday Finish, where the 2016 FedExCup champion and former world No. 1 went 8 under for his last 13 holes at Bay Hill, picking up his 14th PGA TOUR victory. FIVE OBSERVATIONS 1. McIlroy bears watching now more than ever. The 28-year-old former world No. 1 has always been a streaky player who can reel off birdies and wins in bunches. He won The Open Championship, the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational, and the PGA Championship in three consecutive starts in 2014. Now he’s got his sights set on this week’s WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play, and will go for the career Grand Slam at the Masters next month after a much-need injection of confidence at Bay Hill. “It’s huge,â€� said McIlroy, whose victory moved him up to 24th in the FedExCup standings. “The shots that I was able to hit today under pressure, coming down the stretch, the two 5-irons into the par-3s on the back nine, the wedge shots, the putts, the drive on 16, the 3-wood on 18 after the last 3-wood I hit on that hole I hit it OB left on Thursday. “So just stuff that you, all these little barriers that you have to overcome,â€� he added, “whether it be physical or mental, yeah, it’s huge for my confidence going into the next few weeks, and I kept saying I didn’t need a win going into Augusta to feel like I had a chance, I just wanted to see signs of good golf, and thankfully I’ve been able to get both today.â€� 2. We should all get putting lessons from Brad Faxon, as McIlroy looked like he was putting to a pizza-sized hole at Bay Hill. His 100 putts for the week were the fewest of his career, and he led the field in strokes gained: putting, picking up an average of 2.507 strokes per round on the field. “When he is making putts,â€� said playing partner Justin Rose, “he’s incredibly hard to beat.â€� McIlroy’s most dramatic of his eight birdies was a toss-up. He didn’t even need his putter after his nearly 42-foot chip-in from just off the 15th green, and his curling, 25-foot birdie putt on 18 was reminiscent of eight-time API winner Tiger Woods. In fact, McIlroy said afterward, he dialed up his memories of Woods making the exact same putt in order to visualize the line. “Look, I would be lying if I said that I was trying to totally make it,â€� McIlroy said. As for those putting lessons from Faxon, McIlroy said they were more helpful to his psyche than his mechanics, freeing him up to just aim and shoot. Hey, whatever works. 3. Bryson DeChambeau may have the clutch gene. The par on 15? “Unbelievable out of the rough,â€� he said. “I couldn’t believe I got that up and down. That’s a one out of 20 to 30 chance right there.â€� As for the details of his eagle at the par-5 16th hole, DeChambeau was a little fuzzy. ShotLink tells us the drive traveled 331 yards and settled in the right rough. The second shot went 157 yards and cozied up to 15 feet, 8 inches from the pin. The putt snuck in the left edge. “I hit a perfect drive,â€� DeChambeau said. “Just needed to fly like three, four more yards, would have been all the way down in the fairway in the middle of the fairway and unfortunately got down on that down slope in the rough, but was able to somehow get it to 15 feet. I have no idea how it got to 15 feet. Then that putt was nice as well.â€� His birdie try at 17, from just inside 22 feet, veered left at the hole. “I thought it was going right,â€� DeChambeau said. “The book said it was going right, and I hit it and like halfway there I’m like, man, this is on track.â€� Alas, the ball missed and DeChambeau bent low, his hands on his knees. Needing to eagle the par-4 18th hole to tie, he bogeyed it instead, but that was inconsequential as DeChambeau remained in second place alone. “I definitely learned a lot today,â€� he said. “I know that I can play with the best in the world.â€� 4. Justin Rose, 37, is on a major roll. In fact, it’s getting hard to keep up with all of his top-10 finishes, what with his solo third at Bay Hill part of an epic run since last fall. Rose racked up top-10s in all four FedExCup Playoffs events last year; won the WGC-HSBC Champions on Oct. 29; won the European Tour’s Turkish Airlines Open; and already had top-10s at the TOUR’s Farmers Insurance Open (T8) and Valspar Championship (T5) when he got to Orlando. “Obviously a very good week,â€� Rose said. “Fourteen under par on this golf course is never to be sniffed at, I suppose. I got off to a really poor start on Thursday, getting 4 over [through six holes]. I thought it was a good omen for me. I won the U.S. Open from 4 over, I won at Congressional from 4 over, this week I was 4 over early, I was hoping that was a good sign.â€� Rose’s only ho-hum result of late, a T37 at the WGC-Mexico Championship, came in his return to competition after a four-week break. 5. The potential for a Tiger Woods win mesmerized everyone. “It was amazing,â€� said runner-up DeChambeau. “I told my caddie, Tim, on the 11th fairway, I’m like, ‘Man, Tiger’s doing it.’ I mean, I was incredibly happy for him. At the same point in time I’m still trying to win a golf tournament, right?â€� Woods, 42, closed to within a shot of the lead before hooking his tee shot out of bounds left of the 16th fairway. As it turned out, his bogey at the par-5 hole hardly mattered in light of McIlroy’s closing burst of five birdies in his last six holes. Woods (T5) finished 10-under, eight shots back, and moved up eight spots to 35th in the FedExCup standings. “It was a great two weeks of being in contention again,â€� Woods tweeted. “I feel like I’m getting a little better. Great playing by Rory today to win at the King’s place. Arnie would have been proud of golf today and the charges!!!â€� FIVE INSIGHTS 1. McIlroy’s deadeye putting gained 10.027 strokes on the field for the week, which made him No. 1 in strokes gained: putting (not surprising) and was his best-ever performance on the greens. He also was second in the field in putting from outside 10 feet, holing 11 in 39 attempts (28.21 percent). 2. Bay Hill had undergone some changes since Woods won his eighth API in 2013, but length is still hugely important. McIlroy topped the field at 316.5 yards per drive, with DeChambeau second at 309.4, and Woods sixth at 306.8. Ryan Moore (287.1, 65th in the field) was the outlier here as he finished T5. 3. DeChambeau was solid from tee-to-green, ranking in the top 10 in all ball-striking stats, but his short game was merely average with bursts of brilliance. Even with his remarkable up-and-down par at the 15th hole on Sunday, he was 57th in scrambling (55 percent) for the week. 4. Rose triple-bogeyed his second hole of the tournament, but led the field with 24 birdies, two more than McIlroy and Patrick Reed, and finished solo third. Rose was also the only player to beat Woods when paired with him at Bay Hill, edging the 14-time major winner 67 to 69 in the third round. 5. Woods racked up 12 birdies on the par-5s, tied for first in the field. He also was second in strokes gained: around-the-green (+4.356), and eighth in strokes gained: putting (+1.381). Less impressive: He hit eight fairways in each of the first two rounds, and nine in each of the weekend rounds, for a driving accuracy percentage of 60.71, tied for 66th best. He also was behind the curve in greens in regulation; at 62.5 percent, Woods ranked T53 in that stat. TOP THREE VIDEOS

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THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. - Matthew Wolff vowed he wouldn't be too nervous nor would he be trying to impress Tiger Woods in their first competitive PGA TOUR round together. In the end, he did both. Playing with his idol and fellow Southern Californian Woods, the 21-year-old Wolff shook off a rough start in the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP @ SHERWOOD before shooting a respectable 3-under 69. He was matched by another young California kid in the group as 26-year-old Xander Schauffele also showed great poise to rebound from a late triple bogey. But the veteran 82-time TOUR winner they grew up wanting to be like - well, he had a day to forget. RELATED: Full leaderboard | How Tiger has inspired Phil Woods cobbled together a 4-over 76 in his first hit out since missing the cut at the U.S. Open, leaving the defending champion T75 in a 77-man field. The 44-year-old had a dismal day from the tee box, ranked last in the field in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee (-2.770). He hit just seven of 13 fairways. His usual solid approach game was also missing with Woods ranked 75th in Strokes Gained: Approach the Green (-3.129) as he hit just 10 of 18 greens in regulation. An eight-foot birdie putt on the par-5 2nd hole was one of only three putts Woods made outside of five feet throughout the entire round. If Woods is to replicate his win from Japan a year ago, he will need to make up a deficit that already stands at 12 shots after Sebastian Munoz opened with a 64 to lead by one over Justin Thomas and Tyrrell Hatton. He has three rounds to do it given there is no cut, but it looks a tough road to navigate even though he's won at Sherwood five times in the past. For Wolff, it was a rollercoaster to remember. Having grown up nearby the young star has played Sherwood on numerous occasions, but never in competition this serious, and never with Woods. This was the legend he matched by winning the NCAA National Championship and a PGA TOUR event in the same year. They - along with Ben Crenshaw - are the only three to ever manage the feat. So Wolff was wary of falling into the trap of trying to impress the player he once used to watch from the galleries at Sherwood hoping for an autograph or even just a wave. "You do want to impress him and you do want to play well in front of him, but at the end of the day, that’s not what I came here to do. I came here to win a golf tournament," Wolff said prior to the round. "I feel like even though I’m just at the start of my career and I have a lot to prove to everyone, I’ve also accomplished a lot in the short time that I’ve been out here. It would be nice to go out and have Tiger talk about how good you are and stuff... his opinion is definitely a higher value than others..., but at the end of the day, if you don’t have confidence in yourself and you’re just trying to impress him... I just feel that that’s not a really good way to go about it. "I think you need to go out there and try to win a golf tournament no matter who you’re playing with. At the end of the day he’s one of the greatest of all time, but there’s people who have beaten him." Winning the tournament was a long way from possible when he sat two over through his first five holes and made the turn with a 1-over 37. But he stormed back into contention with an eagle, birdie, birdie run on holes 1-3. A few more chances slipped by but Wolff most certainly has a chance to contend after finishing runner up in two of his last three starts. Just days after being pipped at THE CJ CUP @ SHADOW CREEK by Jason Kokrak, Schauffele was flying at 5-under though 11 holes. But he dropped four shots in his next two holes to freefall down the leaderboard. But two birdies in his final three holes ensured he will also start Friday with a chance.

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