Justin Thomas continues to do every little thing however win.
He held the lead late on the again 9 however coughed it up by making two bogies over his ultimate three holes. Thomas handed the Valspar Championship title to Viktor Hovland whereas extending his winless drought to just about three years — his final victory got here on the 2022 PGA Championship at Southern Hills.
“It’s in all probability exhausting to sum all of it up proper now; I’ve slightly harm from the tip there,” Thomas mentioned.
“I’ll take a number of good. Approach, far more good than dangerous.”
Thomas made his seventh birdie of the day on the par-3 fifteenth, climbing to 12-under par and lengthening his lead over Hovland by two. However he got here undone on the sixteenth gap, as he tugged his tee shot nicely left of the green and into the bushes. He might solely summon a bogey, a bogey he was fortunate to make after a poor third shot from the green discovered the greenside bunker.
“I felt like the one nervy swing I really felt was the wedge on 16,” Thomas mentioned.
“That was the one one I felt was it was simply, I used to be uncomfortable slightly bit and form of within the second. However I rebounded very well with a pleasant bunker shot and a pleasant putt.”
On the following gap, the par-3 seventeenth, which includes a lengthy, slim inexperienced, Thomas hammered a 5-iron that settled 15 ft away. He had an opportunity to regain the stroke he had simply misplaced, however his putt simply slipped previous the outlet, leaving him to accept a par.
“One in every of my finest swings of the day with a 5-iron on 17, and someway that putt didn’t go in on 17 as nicely,” Thomas mentioned.
“So I’m very, very happy with myself. It sucks not successful once you’re that shut and have a terrific likelihood, however I simply hopefully put myself in the identical place in two weeks at Augusta and end it off higher.”
A bogey on the tough 18th adopted as Thomas missed one other fairway. However Hovland bogied the 18th as nicely. The distinction was that the Norwegian performed the sixteenth and seventeenth holes in 2-under par, birdieing each, whereas Thomas performed this two-hole stretch in 1-over.
“I felt like if I made this minimize, I used to be going to have an opportunity to win the match,” mentioned Thomas, who was 1-over on the 36-hole mark.
“I had a extremely good likelihood. I’d have felt like if I shot [a 66] earlier than the day began, it will have been adequate. I imply Viktor clearly performed an unbelievable spherical as nicely, birdieing 16 and 17, you already know, he performed nice, he earned it. Yeah, I’ve a number of positives to construct on.”
Thomas should enhance his accuracy off the tee, which plagued him down the stretch at Innisbrook. He’s 108th on the PGA Tour in strokes gained off the tee and 104th in driving accuracy share, discovering the brief grass simply 57% of the time. His wayward tee photographs beset him all through the 2023 season, when he had the worst yr of his profession. He missed the minimize at Augusta Nationwide that yr and didn’t make the weekend at The Masters final yr as nicely.
But, the two-time PGA Champion is tenth on tour in strokes gained whole and is sixteenth in scoring common. He additionally has 4 top-10 finishes this yr, tied with Corey Conners and Russell Henley for essentially the most on tour. Thomas has performed nicely, doing so at a world-class stage. But when he finds himself contending at Augusta, the important thing for Thomas will likely be to maintain the ball in play off the tee. If he can try this, he’ll ‘end higher’, and maybe that ‘higher’ will end in a Inexperienced Jacket.
Jack Milko is a golf workers author for SB Nation’s Enjoying Via. Comply with him on X @jack_milko.
