LIV Title: Open champion Cameron Smith won the LIV Golf Invitational-Chicago by three shots with a final round of three-under 69.
In the third and final round, Smith was only momentarily in danger, and he went on to win his first championship since switching to the LIV series. The 13th hole’s 10-foot par putt was one of the crucial moments, and neither Dustin Johnson nor Peter Uihlein could get close to him.
Smith’s share of the $20 million prize pool for the individual play was $4 million.
“I think I had to prove to myself and other people that I’m still a great player, I’m still out here to win golf tournaments,” Smith said. “I didn’t have my best stuff, but I stuck tough and made some putts.”
At Rich Harvest Farms, Johnson (70) and Uihlein (69) both made a birdie on the par-five 18th hole to tie for second place and earn a total of $1,812,500 each.
Johnson, Talor Gooch, Patrick Reed, and Pat Perez each received an additional $750,000 for helping their team win their fourth straight match with Johnson’s birdie. Johnson has already earned slightly over $12.5 million from his five events.
The second-place finish for Uihlein’s team, led by Brooks Koepka, earned each member of the squad $375,000 in prize money. Uihlein earned close to $2.2 million on Sunday thanks to his individual and team’s second-place performance.
Most of the damage was caused by Smith’s short game. He hammered a flop shop to a foot on the par-five eleventh for another birdie after making enough birdies on the front nine to maintain his lead.
Prior to Smith’s crucial par, Uihlein had scored a birdie on the 13th and appeared to have a chance to cut the margin to one shot.
Smith eliminated any lingering doubts by driving his approach ball over the water to four feet on the par-five 17th hole to take a three-shot lead into the finish and then holing an 18-foot birdie putt to equal Phil Mickelson’s team for a third.
With a 66 and a tie for eighth place, Mickelson recorded his best round since joining the Saudi-funded LIV Golf team. This was his first top-10 result in five competitions.
The only participant from the 48-person field to have placed in the top 10 at each LIV Golf competition is Johnson. Two weeks prior, he had just won a play-off game outside of Boston.
The highest-ranked player to join LIV Golf, Australian Robert Smith, 29, had just finished the PGA Tour season and was rated No. 2 in the world.
Johnson, a two-time major champion and the longest-reigning No. 1 since Tiger Woods, continues to be one of the most important players to sign up.
“He’s probably the one who you look at it feeling he’s going to be at the top of the leaderboard every week,” Smith said. I hope he thinks the same of me, and hopefully, we can keep it going.
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