Xander Schauffele delivered the knockout punch when it mattered.
His lob wedge from 105 yards to 3 feet at the final hole clinched his sixth career PGA Tour title and first individual stroke-play victory since the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions.
“It feels really good,” he said of converting his first 54-hole lead into victory. “Everyone talks about how hard it is and I only had the Olympics to sort of fall back on having a lead and kind of closing it. I’ve never done it on the PGA Tour.”
Schauffele made the short birdie putt at the last to close in 2-under 68 at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, Connecticut for a 72-hole total of 19-under 261 and a two-stroke victory over Sahith Theegala and J.T. Poston at the Travelers Championship.
Schauffele had tasted victory just a few months ago when he partnered with Patrick Cantlay to win the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, the Tour’s lone official team event in late April. His so-called victory drought also didn’t reflect that he won the individual men’s gold medal in golf at the Tokyo Olympics last August.
At the Travelers, Schauffele, 28, opened with a pair of 63s, went a career-best 48 holes to start the tournament without a bogey and posted a career-low 54-hole aggregate of 193. Still, he was winless the four previous times he’d held the 54-hole lead or co-lead and the finale turned into a battle to the finish.
On Sunday, Schauffele played solidly if not as spectacularly as he had the first three days. He made a bogey at the first but bounced back with three birdies in his first 11 holes to extend the lead to three and seemed well on his way to victory, even after an errant drive led to a bogey at No. 12.
First, 20-year-old amateur Michael Thorbjornsen made a run at doing something special. He carded an eagle and four birdies in a six-hole stretch beginning at the par-5 sixth hole to climb within a stroke of Schauffele. He was bidding to become the first amateur to win on the Tour since Phil Mickelson at the 1991 Northern Telecom Open. But the Stanford rising junior who grew up 90 minutes away in Wellesley, Massachusetts, ran out of steam, making bogeys at Nos. 12 and 13, to finish fourth.
After making his professional debut at the 2020 Travelers Championship, Theegala, 24, was seeking his first Tour title, too. He started with a birdie at the first and tied Schauffele for the lead with a two-putt birdie from 77 feet at the drivable 15th hole.
Theegala surged in front with a…
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