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Hovland's 6-under 66 brought him to 18-under 270 for the
tournament, one better than Scottie Scheffler. His victory came
after a Sunday collapse from third-round leader Collin Morikawa.
Hovland carded back-to-back eagles at the par-4 14th and par-5
15th holes, followed by a birdie at No. 16 to reach 20 under.
But he nearly gave away the lead with a bogey on the final two
holes at Albany Golf Course.
"Honestly, when I first teed off and obviously got off to just
making a few pars early on, I didn't really think winning was
even in question," Hovland said.
"But after I made three birdies in a row at the end of the front
nine and I got to No. 9 and I was in the greenside bunker and I
looked up at the leaderboard and I saw I believe I was tied for
the lead, maybe one shot behind or something like that, that's
when I knew, 'OK, if I play really well on the back nine, I've
got a chance.'"
At No. 14, Hovland holed out for eagle from a greenside bunker.
He reached the green in two shots on the par-5 15th and made a
straight, mid-length putt for the next eagle.
The 24-year-old won four weeks ago at the World Wide Technology
Championship at Mayakoba. His victory Sunday will not count as
an official PGA Tour win nor earn him FedEx Cup points -- the
20-man event is organized by Tiger Woods to benefit his TGR
Foundation -- but it will accrue him Official World Golf Ranking
points.
Sam Burns (69) and Patrick Reed (69) finished tied for third at
15 under.
Morikawa began the day with a five-shot lead at 18 under. A
victory would have pushed him temporarily into No. 1 in the
world ranking. Instead, a pair of double bogeys at Nos. 4 and 6
doomed him to a 4-over 76.
Morikawa tied for fifth at 14 under with Justin Thomas, whose 64
was the round of the day.
"Obviously a little sad to see him not play his best today,"
Hovland said of his friend and contemporary. "He's a great
player and I expected him to just kind of roll away with the
victory, but sometimes this sport is not that easy and I'm sure
he'll come back even stronger."
Thomas made an eagle, eight birdies and two bogeys Sunday.
"For as bad (as) some of the golf shots that I hit this week, I
hit way more really, really good ones," Thomas said. "I mean,
obviously worked plenty hard the last couple weeks, but I wasn't
exactly my normal preparation with Thanksgiving the week prior.
I was glad to at least have a good one today to salvage a decent
week."
--Field Level Media
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