We start our golf recap with the Players Championship, which is widely considered the “fifth major” around the golf world. It was only fitting that the No. 1 player in the world stepped up and delivered one of the best performances of his career. Jason Day’s dominance stole the spotlight on a weekend when The Players Championship was front and center. The LPGA had the weekend off while Wang Jeunghun continued to turn heads with a record-setting performance at the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open. Here is a recap of the events from around the golf world this past weekend.
The Players Championship
PGA Tour
Our PGA Tour golf recap starts with Jason Day, who delivered one of the most dominant performances of his career over the weekend to win The Players Championship. The world No. 1 didn’t allow a single golfer to close within more than two strokes of him on Sunday as he delivered a bogey-free final round to complete the wire-to-wire victory. Day became the third different No. 1 player to win The Players Championship, joining Greg Norman (1994) and Tiger Woods (2001 and 2013). The 28-year-old Australian finished at 15-under for his seventh title in the past 10 months. Perhaps the most impressive aspect of his dominance has been that each of those wins has come against relatively strong fields including at The Players, the PGA Championship, a World Golf Championship event and a pair of FedEx Cup events. Day earned a $1.89 million check for the victory, which is the richest payoff in golf. Other notables included Kevin Chapell recording a runner-up finish at 11-under, Justin Thomas, Matt Kuchar, Colt Knost and Ken Duke finished tied for third at 10-under and Rory McIlroy finishing tied for 12th at 7-under. McIlroy is the only golfer in his 20’s with more wins than Day at this point with 11, compared to Day’s 10. Day has opened up a considerable lead at the top of the world rankings following a missed cut for Jordan Spieth at TPC Sawgrass – he has finished outside of the top-10 only seven times in his past 20 starts overall. Meanwhile, Spieth has recorded four top-10’s this season but he has now missed the cut at two of his last eight events with only two top-10 finishes over that span.
Spieth has taken a lot of heat at time this season and one of those times is now. There were a lot of memes going on this weekend after he missed the cut, including a slew of funny images and Beyonce reaction gifs. It’s clear that this wasn’t his best week. He responded via social media himself, taking to Twitter to show a throwback photo of him wearing big shades as a child with the hashtag “blocking haters”. He’s noticed the heat and he’s not taking too kindly to it. Although Day won this weekend, the Spieth news might be the more important tidbits from our golf recap.
Top 10 The Players Championship
Jason Day -15
Kevin Chappell -11
Justin Thomas -10
Matt Kuchar -10
Colt Knost -10
Ken Duke -10
Francesco Molinari -9
Hideki Matsuyama -9
Graeme McDowell -8
Daniel Berger -8
AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open
European Tour
Our EPGA Tour golf recap starts with South Korea’s Wang Jeunghun, who became the youngest player in European Tour history to win consecutive events when he delivered a victory at the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open. The 20-year-old Wang, who won his maiden title in Morocco last week, took advantage of a late collapse by Siddikur Rahman of Bangladesh to claim a one-shot victory. Siddikur held a three-shot lead with three holes to play but double-bogeyed the 16th and dropped another shot on 17 to open the door for Wang to rally back for the win. Both players missed the green with their approaches on 18 but it was Wang who got up and down for a crucial birdie to finish at six-under for the win. Wang and Rahman are the only players that finished better than even for the tournament.
Top 10 AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open
Jeunghun Wang -6
Siddikur Rahman -5
Nicolas Colsaerts E
Estanislao Goya E
Andrew Dodt +1
Brandon Stone +2
Rahl Gangjee +3
Richard McEvoy +3
Ross McGowan +3
Terry Pilkadaris +3
