BROOKLINE, Mass. (AP) – A playoff was approaching at the U.S. Open on Sunday, as is always the case at The Country Club, when Matt Fitzpatrick measured his shot from a left bunker on 18th Street.
He had a one-off advantage over Will Zalatoris and Masters champion Scottie Scheffler. It had a large piece of grass full of roughness in front of it, along with an open bunker that protected the green and a flag 156 meters away. No less than a U.S. Open title was at stake.
In a new back full of clutch moments, Fitzpatrick offered the biggest of all.
“One of the best shots I’ve ever made,” he said.
Fitzpatrick struck a 9-foot iron that began around the steep lip – a “narrow fade”, he called – carried the front bunker and settled 18 feet away, setting a pair for a 2 under 68 which made the Englishman a great champion of his first professional victory in America.
He won the U.S. Amateur at Brookline in 2013, becoming only the second man to win a U.S. Amateur and the U.S. Open on the same course. Jack Nicklaus, the name of the gold medal around his neck, walked around Pebble Beach. Juli Inkster won the U.S. Women’s Amateur and the U.S. Women’s Open at Prairie Dunes.
“The feeling is out of this world,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s a cliché, but it’s something you dream of as a child. Yes, to achieve that, I can retire to a happy man tomorrow.”
Zalatoris, with remarkable resistance during a tense battle in Brookline, had a 15-foot birdie to force a playoff. He fell to his knees as the putt slid down the left edge of the cup. He shot 69 and was runner-up for the third time in the last seven majors.
Zalatoris and Scheffler, who previously had a longer birdie putt to catch up with Fitzpatrick, did their best. Fitzpatrick was convinced his time had come and grabbed him.
“Matt’s shot on the 18th will probably be shown for the rest of the history of the US Open,” Zalatoris said. “I went through it, and I thought it would be a little hard to go and look for it. But the fact that it took it out and it even looked like a bird was amazing.
“So not the hat. Obviously he played really well all week and today he has given a solid round.”
The celebration seemed familiar to me. Fitzpatrick shared a tearful hug with his parents and younger brother Alex, who made a caddy for him at the Amateur. He stayed with the same family.
The reward was $ 3.15 million and a title – a major champion – that money can’t buy.
One of the first phone calls came from Nicklaus, the four-time U.S. Open champion. It turns out that Fitzpatrick won the membership at The Bear’s Club, the course Nicklaus built in South Florida, and what the golden bear said that day was not forgotten.
“He abused me a little earlier this year. He said, ‘Finally. Congratulations on winning the States,'” Fitzpatrick said. And then, lifting the trophy slightly, Fitzpatrick sent a funny message to Nicklaus: “Jack, I won a second time.”
There was a good rest, a shot and a little courage at the end.
Fitzpatrick and Zalatoris were tied until the 15th when the Englishman hit his starting shot so far right that he entered the gallery and found a decent lie on the dead and trampled grass. Zalatoris failed only a few meters and was buried in the deep grass.
“I feel like we’ve had moments all year where I haven’t taken a break, I haven’t had a lie, I haven’t had a rebound. This time I get there and the ball is perfectly fine, “said Fitzpatrick.” It was one of the best shots I’ve hit all day. “
He bottled a 5-foot iron from 220 yards to 18 feet below the hole. Zalatoris entered the front bunker, fired up to 25 feet and made a bogey. Fitzpatrick took a two-shot lead when his birdie putt entered the cup at such a perfect pace that he didn’t even touch the pin he left in the cup.
“Doing this and taking advantage of the break I had was fantastic,” Fitzpatrick said.
Zalatoris bounced back, grabbing a 16-to-7-foot par-3 hard pin for birdie to reduce the lead to one shot. They both missed 12-foot birdie opportunities on the 17th, and then Fitzpatrick missed a fairway at the wrong time. It looked like a playoff was eminent: the previous three U.S. Open in Brookline were decided for a playoff, until the time of his life.
Fitzpatrick finished 6 under 274. He became the first Englishman since Justin Rose in 2013 to win the U.S. Open, and he felt his time had come.
He is meticulous in drawing up his plans and keeps a record of them to identify what he needs to work on. And he emphasized the speed in his swing of the last two years, giving him the length and the belief to compete with anyone.
That didn’t make Sunday any easier, a three-man race from the start when Jon Rahm and Rory McIlroy fell behind and never joined the mix.
Fitzpatrick and Zalatoris, who shared the 54-hole lead, each had a two-shot lead at one point.
Zalatoris, who lost in a playoff game against Justin Thomas in the PGA Championship last month, bounced back from two early bogeys. They were tied when Zalatoris made an 18-foot bird putt on the 11th short par-3, and Fitzpatrick made three puts per bogey from the same range.
The 25-year-old from Dallas suddenly had a two-shot lead. He also couldn’t keep the ball on the fairway, and it cost him a drop shot at number 12. And then came another big turning point, with Fitzpatrick sinking a 50-foot birdie putt through the 13th green. Zalatoris did well to make his 15 feet for the pair and headed for the tense finish.
Hideki Matsuyama had the lowest round of the week with 65, but finished with 3 under 277, and that would never be good enough. McIlroy had a 69 and finished the group four shots behind with Collin Morikawa (66).
Fitzpatrick couldn’t help but smile as he took home the silver trophy, big, silver and shiny as the U.S. amateur award, but much more significant. And there was another touching moment at the end. His caddy, Billy Foster, one of the oldest and most popular loopers in Europe, took out the 18th pin flag. This is his trophy.
“Billy said it for a while to keep doing what you’re doing and the opportunity will come,” Fitzpatrick said. “He did, and I took it.”
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