Brooks Koepka shows off the Wanamaker Trophy after winning the PGA Championship on Sunday at Bellerive Country Club in St. Louis.ST. LOUIS - The roars were unlike anything Brooks Koepka had ever heard, and he knew exactly what they meant.
They got louder for each birdie by Tiger Woods that moved him closer to the lead Sunday in the final round of the PGA Championship, and Koepka could hear a ripple effect of noise.
First, real time. Seconds later, another burst from patrons watching on TV in chalets. Then, distant cheers from every corner of Bellerive Country Club when the score was posted.
"We knew what was going on," Koepka said. "It's pretty obvious when Tiger makes a birdie. Everybody on the golf course cheers for him."
Koepka knew exactly what to do. Amid relentless pandemonium, he ran off three straight birdies to end the front nine and seize control. When he was tied with Adam Scott through 14 holes, with Woods one shot behind, he delivered back-to-back birdies.
The last one was a laser of a 4-iron shot from 248 yards out that settled six feet away from the hole, sending him to a dream finish of a year that began with the 28-year-old Floridian wondering if a wrist injury that kept him out four months would ever allow him to compete again.
"That will probably go down as probably one of the best shots I've ever hit under pressure," he said.
He closed with a 4-under-par 66 for a two-shot victory over Woods and took his place among the elite in golf. Koepka became the fifth player to win the U.S. Open and PGA Championship in the same year, joining Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus, Gene Sarazen and Woods.
It will be impossible to overlook him now, not with the Wanamaker Trophy to go with his back-to-back U.S. Open titles. Koepka won two of the three majors he played this year - he missed the Masters - and he has won three of his past six. Not since 14-time major winner Woods won four in a row through the 2001 Masters has anyone won golf's biggest events at such an amazing rate.
Yet it still felt - and certainly sounded - as though he played second billing to Woods. The crowd was enormous, louder than anything in golf this side of Augusta National or a Ryder Cup, and Woods looked closer than ever to capping his comeback from four back surgeries with another major title.
Even with two bogeys, Woods shot a 64 for his lowest final round in a major. He finished at 14-under 266, beating by three shots his best 72-hole score in a major.
At this major, it wasn't enough.
"I played hard," Woods said. "I made a bit of a run. It looks like I'm going to come up a little short."
Koepka was responsible for that. After wasting one chance to put it away by missing consecutive birdie chances seven feet from the hole, Koepka kept attacking flags and ran in birdie putts of 10 feet on No. 15 and seven feet on No. 16 to end the drama. He tapped in for par on the final hole to set the PGA Championship scoring record at 264. It also tied the major championship record that Henrik Stenson set at Royal Troon Golf Club two years ago in the British Open.
Koepka also joined Nicklaus, Jordan Spieth, Tom Watson and Woods as the only players since World War II with three major titles before turning 30.
"Three majors at 28 - it's a cool feeling," said Koepka, who five years ago was toiling in Europe's minor leagues.
Scott hung around by making big putts, just like he hoped, and was tied for the lead until Koepka's birdies. Scott missed a six-foot birdie putt on the par-5 17th that would have pulled him to within one shot - right after Koepka missed from the same range - and then made bogey on the 18th for a 67 to finish alone in third, a stroke behind Woods.
The only knock on Koepka is that he doesn't win enough elsewhere - the Phoenix Open on the PGA Tour, the Turkish Airlines Open on the European Tour, and two victories at the Dunlop Phoenix on the Japan Golf Tour are his others.
That doesn't seem so important right now.
"He's won three majors now, so he's definitely winning the right ones," Scott said. "If I was him, I wouldn't change much at the moment. I'd just keep doing what he's doing, because he's showing up at the right moments in the biggest events. There's something inside his brain that makes him believe that that's what he's destined to do."
Tiger for Ryder?
U.S. captain Jim Furyk will have to decide whether Woods is worthy of making his Ryder Cup team.
One of his vice captains sure thinks so.
After making a charge at the victory that would have locked up his spot, Woods said he wants to do much more than just help Furyk call the shots as an assistant when the Americans head to France next month in a bid to hold on to the trophy. Woods wants to be hitting some shots, too.
"I do want to be on the team as a player. I'm going to be there either way," Woods said. "Our captain has some decisions to make after the first (FedEx Cup) playoff events, and we'll sit down and give him our input and what we think and who should be on the team and who can contribute to the team, and hopefully my name will be part of that process."
It's a pretty safe bet. The PGA Championship was the last event to secure one of the top eight spots in the Ryder Cup standings and an automatic berth to the team. For all the craziness that went down, there was no real movement among the eight players who secured their spots.
Gillman champ again
KINGSTON SPRINGS, Tenn. - Kristen Gillman won the U.S. Women's Amateur for the second time, beating University of Alabama teammate Jiwon Jeon 7 and 6 in the 36-hole final at The Golf Club of Tennessee.
Gillman, 20, from Austin, Texas, also won in 2014.
On Sunday, she was 5 up after nine holes, winning four straight on Nos. 4-7. She was 5 up after 18 holes and increased the margin to seven on the second 18.
Gillman won the Japan LPGA's Century 21 Ladies Golf Tournament last month for her first victory in a professional event. She also starred in U.S. victories in the Curtis Cup and Palmer Cup. She tied for 27th this year in the U.S. Women's Open.
Jeon, 21, is from South Korea. She transferred from Daytona State College in Florida to Alabama, with Gillman serving as Jeon's host when she took her recruiting trip to Tuscaloosa last fall.