Travelers Championship on PGA Tour concludes as Fredrik Jacobson bags his maiden title
The eighteenth event on the PGA Tour for the season, the Travelers Championship, came to an end with Sweden’s Fredrik Jacobson posting his maiden victory on the tour on Sunday June, 26.
The tournament received jolts in the opening rounds, when play was suspended twice due to thunderstorms and bad light. TPC River Highlands, one of the shortest of courses on the tour, played brilliantly otherwise. The winner, Jacobson posted the lowest score
for the season; 20-under, 260.
The event also saw one of the record breaking performances by the University of California Los Angeles graduate, Patrick Cantlay, when he pulled in a 10-under, 60 to stun the field. Cantlay later succumbed to disappointing rounds of 70 and 72 to slide down
the leaderboard.
Jacobson, the 36-year-old former European Tour member, has been playing on the PGA Tour since 2003. Although having won thrice on the other side of the Atlantic, a victory on the American soil was long overdue. He came close to winning an event and has finished
three-times as a runner-up, but never actually moved to bag a title in his ventures on the PGA.
Jacobson started off the season with some strong finishes and was more than hopeful this time around to break the ice. The Swede made all the cuts in his 18 appearances this year except missing three of them. His best results came in the Valero Texas Open
where he finished tied for fifth and Arnold Palmer Invitational where he finished for a joint ninth.
The 36-year-old not only made the cut at last week’s US Open, the second major of the season, but went all the way to close his bid for a joint 14th. This was Jacobson’s first victory in his 188 starts on the tour.
Americans Ryan Moore and John Rollins finished one stroke behind Jacobson, to settle for a joint second. Both posted final rounds of seven-under, 63 to share the runner-up prize money. Two shots back, Michael Thompson finished for an outright third with
his aggregate score of 18-under, 262. He pulled in a stunning round of eight-under, 62 on the final day to move up the leaderboard.
Cantlay proved to be another of those one-round wonders when he fell for a disappointing closing round of 70 and 72. The young trailblazer thrashed the course record on Friday when he amassed an eye-popping 10-under, 60, sending shivers down the rest of
the field.
"I just learned what it's like to have a week on the PGA TOUR, to make the cut and to compete with all the guys," said Cantlay, the low amateur at Congressional last week. "This was just my second go-around and it was a lot of fun. The ovations are special
every time."
Defending champion Bubba Watson finished eleven strokes behind the leader to finish tied for 38th.
Tags: