As the ultimate group made the flip to the again 9, Collin Morikawa held a three-shot benefit and seemed destined to win on the PGA Tour for the primary time since October 2023.
As much as that time, he had performed near-flawless golf, relying closely on his iron play to pluck his approach round Bay Hill, maybe probably the most difficult course that PGA Tour professionals will play all 12 months. Morikawa sat at 11-under par on the tenth tee, however then, on the primary gap on the again 9, he missed the golf green by a few toes. His ball settled right into a brutal lie. He then hacked his second shot into the entrance greenside bunker, which introduced bogey into play. Morikawa then didn’t get up-and-down to save lots of par, dropping again to 10-under, the place he began the day.
The previous California Golden Bear then picked up that dropped shot on the par-5 twelfth, which proved to be his closing birdie of the spherical. Morikawa nonetheless held a three-shot lead at that juncture, however he started to lose momentum on the par-3 14th gap.
Morikawa missed the inexperienced brief and confronted a fragile chip-shot from an unfavorable lie within the fairway. Just like the tenth, he couldn’t save his par.
In the meantime, his enjoying accomplice, Russell Henley, fired a dart into the 14th inexperienced and drained a 10-footer for birdie to chop into the deficit. It was a two-shot swing, and abruptly, Morikawa felt all of the stress for the primary time all day.
After each gamers made par on the difficult fifteenth gap, the match utterly flipped on the par-5 sixteenth gap, the simplest gap on the course. Morikawa missed the golf green and located the bunker off the tee. He might solely muster a par, a disappointing rating contemplating this gap yielded 26 birdies and 6 eagles on Sunday.
And a kind of eagles got here from Henley, who chipped-in for a 3 from off the inexperienced to seize the lead. Like that, Morikawa’s three shot lead evaporated and Henley finally held on to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational by a stroke over the two-time main winner.
Morikawa has performed terrific golf for the previous 12 months, ever since his top-three end at Augusta Nationwide final April. However even then, Morikawa admitted that “greed” value him a shot at successful the Inexperienced Jacket as Scottie Scheffler emerged victorious. Different notable outcomes since April 2024 embrace a runner-up end to Scheffler on the Memorial and the Tour Championship. He additionally tied for fourth on the Genesis Scottish Open and completed solo fourth at Colonial.
Quick ahead to this 12 months and Morikawa has been knocking on the door once more, unable to interrupt that barrier down. He completed The Sentry at 32-under par, however misplaced to Hideki Matsuyama by three. It marked the bottom rating for a runner-up in PGA Tour historical past.
His subsequent two begins got here on the AT&T Pebble Seaside Professional-Am and the Genesis Invitational, the place he posted a pair of T-17s. Strong begins, little doubt, however he performed significantly better this week at Bay Hill. And but, he has no trophy to indicate for it.
Morikawa didn’t essentially choke away the Arnold Palmer Invitational on Sunday, however he didn’t do something to win it. As a substitute, he watched Henley cross him by, leaving him shocked and asking, ‘Did this actually occur once more?’
Certainly, Morikawa’s winless drought will proceed into subsequent week’s Gamers Championship, the place he has but to put up a top-10 end. His finest end result at TPC Sawgrass got here two years in the past, when he tied for thirteenth. Maybe that may change this week, as he’s hitting the ball in addition to he did in 2020 and 2021, when he gained a pair of main championships that shortly cemented him as top-of-the-line gamers on the earth.
Then once more, Morikawa appears to have a psychological barrier of getting the job executed proper now. Successful on the PGA Tour is difficult, and doing so at a course like Bay Hill much more so. However he let a terrific probability at successful slip away as this loss will doubtless follow him for a while.
Jack Milko is a golf employees author for SB Nation’s Enjoying By. Comply with him on X @jack_milko.
