When the squad hits Vegas and leaves with $3.4M it must be deemed a good week. That’s exactly what happened at the CJ Cup @ Summit, where Rory McIlroy captured his 20th PGA Tour victory at the young-in-golf-years age of 32. He’s just the 6th player in history to have 20 professional wins before the age of 33.
Rory went on an absolute heater on Saturday (the 3rd round), compiling a 62 at Summit Club on the strength of his signature towering drives and a dialed in Spider X Hydro Blast putter. His speed on the greens was perfect all week, as he finished No. 1 in Strokes Gained Putting (1.51). He delivered a vintage Rory performance off the tee with a solid Strokes Gained number of 1.37 on his tee shots. After the final round, he revealed that he’s spent the last few weeks reflecting after his struggles at the Ryder Cup and made a commitment to simply “being me.”
When Rory is himself on the golf course and putts well, he’s hard to bet against.
"...Being me is good enough. Maybe the last few months I was trying to add things to my game, take things away. When I do the things I do well, this is what I’m capable of...winning a lot of events on the PGA Tour and being the number one player in the world. It’s just a matter of me getting back to playing golf and playing golf my way. That starts with being creative and being visual and sifting through the technical thoughts."Rory McIlroy
When Rory is himself on the golf course, and putts well, he’s hard to bet against.
After hitting a long eagle putt on the 14th hole in the final round to reach 25-under, it seemed like a Rory win was all but sealed. However, moments later fellow Team TaylorMader, Collin Morikawa, dropped an eagle of his own on the 72nd hole to post a score of 24-under and claim leader in the clubhouse. Playing at his home course, Collin made a strong run on the weekend with scores of 65 and 62 to finish in solo-second, delivering a valiant home-field defense.
"The whole week leading up to this I just tried to visualize every shot that I hit. Tried to see draws, see fades, see high and see low and just try and play around with it. When it boils down to it, all you need to do out there is hit the shots and sometimes I forgot that in a quest to try to be too perfect, probably. This week was a great reminder that you don’t need to be perfect to be a great golfer.”Rory McIlroy
Rounding out third place was Rickie Fowler, who put on an immaculate ball-striking display for the week with his pix TP5 golf ball. It was his best finish since 2019 and bodes well for the upcoming season.
For the week, Team TaylorMade finished 1-2-3 on the leaderboard behind the strength of SIIM2, P•Series irons and TP5/TP5x golf ball, respectively.
Rory’s Scoreline
- Strokes Gained Putting No. 1 (1.51)
- Strokes Gained Off the Tee No. 2 (1.37)
- Scrambling No. 2 (88.9%)
- Total Driving Distance No. 4 (321.2 yards)
Let’s put Rory McIlroy’s dominant 62-66 weekend at The CJ Cup in the proper perspective. Highlighted by his tournament leading 1.51 Strokes Gained Putting, Rory led in that category wire-to-wire for the first time since his 2018 win at Bay Hill.
Pair that with his 1.37 strokes gained off the tee, and Rory vaulted himself into some impressive PGA Tour company with his 20th career win.
What You Need to Know
- Rory jumped into the top-35 on the all-time PGA Tour wins list, becoming the 39th golfer to total 20 wins, good for T35
- He became the seventh golfer to earn 20 PGA TOUR wins before age 33 joining an elite list of: Arnold Palmer, Billy Casper, Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson
- Rory is also now the sixth player in The Masters Era (since 1934) to win 20 PGA Tour events including 4 majors before age 33 joining yet another famed list of: Byron Nelson, Nicklaus, Palmer, Watson and Woods
- And Rory is the 2nd-youngest player from outside the United States to reach 20 PGA Tour wins behind Harry Cooper, who achieved the feat at age 31
- Strokes Gained Putting No. 1 (1.51)
- Strokes Gained Off the Tee No. 2 (1.37)
- Scrambling No. 2 (88.9%)
- Total Driving Distance No. 4 (321.2 yards)
Rory’s win at the CJ Cup came 11 years after his first PGA Tour win at Quail Hollow, two days before his 21st birthday. Two years later, he then went on to become the youngest multi-major championship winner since Seve Ballesteros.
- 2010: Quail Hollow Championship
- 2011: U.S. Open
- 2012: The Honda Classic, PGA Championship, Duetsche Bank Championship, BMW Championship
- 2014: The Open Championship, WGC Bridgestone Invitational, PGA Championship
- 2015: WGC Cadillac Match Play, Wells Fargo Championship
- 2016: Deutsche Bank Championship, TOUR Championship
- 2018: Arnold Palmer Invitational
- 2019: THE PLAYERS Championship, RBC Canadian Open, TOUR Championship
- 2020: WGC HSBC Champions
- 2021: Wells Fargo Championship
- 2022: THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT
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