IVINS, Utah — Matt McCarty started the year on the Korn Ferry Tour.
He’s headed to the Masters next April after earning his first PGA Tour victory Sunday at the Black Desert Championship, doing so with a final round of 4-under-par 67 and one swing that all but sealed it.
McCarty won three times on the Korn Ferry Tour to earn an instant promotion in August. In his third start on the PGA Tour — and second straight as a card-carrying member — he made winning look just as easy. Staked to a two-shot lead going into the final round of the 72-hole tournament at Black Desert Resort, he never trailed over the last 18 and won by three shots.
Chattanooga resident Stephan Jaeger closed within one stroke with back-to-back birdies on the 13th and 14th. McCarty effectively ended any threat with a 3-wood shot on the 310-yard 14th that was close to perfect, bounding onto the green and settling 3 1/2 feet from the cup for an eagle putt he converted.
The victory means the 26-year-old left-hander from Arizona is assured of being in three of the four majors next year. He gets into the Masters and the PGA Championship with his PGA Tour title, and McCarty already earned a spot in the U.S. Open by leading the Korn Ferry Tour points list.
McCarty is the first player since Jason Gore to win three times on the developmental tour to earn an instant promotion and then win on the PGA Tour in the same season. Gore’s victory at the 84 Lumber Classic in September 2005 remains the 50-year-old’s lone win on the top-tier circuit.
McCarty finished at 23-under 261 — Jaeger had a second straight 68 after opening 65-63 — and earned $1.35 million.
“I don’t know how you can expect this,” McCarty said. “It’s just a lot of fun. I’ve been working really hard. This year was great for me. To get out here a little early, to get some experience was great and obviously this now.
“It’s just been a crazy last few months for me.”
McCarty didn’t face much stress — he can attribute that to some beautiful lag putting — except for that one brief moment when Jaeger made a late move.
All the potential challengers went the other direction for much of the sunny day in southwestern Utah that wrapped up the Beehive State’s first time hosting a PGA Tour event in 61 years.
Joe Highsmith, playing in the final group, made a double bogey on the opening hole. Harris English — like Jaeger, he is a Baylor School graduate — had three bogeys on the front nine that offset three birdies and kept him from making a move. Jaeger, who went toe to toe with top-ranked Scottie Scheffler to win the Houston Open in March, managed only one birdie on the front nine.
McCarty motored along, leading by three, not dropping a shot until a three-putt from 55 feet from below a ridge on the 12th hole. And then when Jaeger holed a five-foot birdie putt on the 13th and drove the 14th green for a two-putt birdie to close within one, McCarty answered.
He hit a draw with his 3-wood, stared it down and said: “Turn!” That it did, landing short of the green and slowing into the grain to nearly tap-in range. Jaeger, two groups ahead of him, had three straight birdie putts burn the edge of the cup.
Jaeger closed with a birdie on the par-5 18th and finished as the sole runner-up a week after yet another Baylor grad, Keith Mitchell, tied for third while missing a playoff by a stroke at the PGA Tour’s Sanderson Farms Championship.
“I gave myself a shot,” Jaeger said. “I didn’t drive it well enough to give myself shorter clubs in and ample opportunity for birdie. But sometimes you have that. I made some nice putts coming in, so I’m happy with that.”
Lucas Glover (62) and Kevin Streelman (69) tied for third at 19, with Matti Schmid (62) another stroke behind. English shared sixth place with Highsmith at 17 under after each closed with a 71.
AP file photo by Sue Ogrocki / Baylor School graduate Harris English was among the top finishers Sunday at the PGA Tour’s Black Desert Championship.‘Long time coming’
CARY, N.C. — Jerry Kelly closed with a 5-under 67 and won the SAS Championship when Padraig Harrington narrowly missed an eight-foot par putt that would have forced a playoff, giving Kelly his first PGA Tour Champions victory in two years.
Kelly was bogey-free and had a two-shot lead on the back nine at Prestonwood Country Club until he failed to birdie the par-5 17th and then three-putted from 40 feet on the 18th, sending his first putt some 10 feet by the hole.
He finished the 54-hole tournament at 13-under 203 and was preparing for a playoff when Harrington, who started the final round with a three-shot lead, hit a superb pitch to set up his birdie on the 17th.
They were tied for the lead until Harrington went long on the 18th from the fairway, chipped about eight feet by and lipped out the par putt. Harrington shot 71 and finished alone in second, two strokes ahead of Shane Bertsch (70).
Kelly won for the 12th time on the 50-and-older circuit, but the first time since the Shaw Charity Classic in August 2022. He had spent most of this year dealing with a wrist injury and rheumatoid arthritis.
“It’s been a long time coming,” Kelly said. “You wonder if you’re ever going to do it again when the injuries start piling up.”
The SAS Championship was the final tournament before the Charles Schwab Cup playoffs start next week for the tour’s top 72 players. Ernie Els goes into the postseason as the No. 1 seed.
AP file photo by Charlie Neibergall / Jerry Kelly won the SAS Championship on Sunday for the 12th victory of his PGA Tour Champions career.Ticket to Dubai
SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, France — Dan Bradbury closed with a 5-under 66 to win the Open de France by one stroke, finishing the 72-hole tournament at 16-under 268.
The 25-year-old Englishman stepped it up with four birdies on the back nine to earn his second career win on the Europe-based DP World Tour. He held off Denmark’s Jeff Winther after he shot up the leaderboard with seven birdies in his faultless round of 64.
Winther could only par the last two holes and tied for second with fellow Danish player Thorbjorn Olesen (68), England’s Sam Bairstow (68) and Germany’s Yannik Paul (66) at Le Golf National on the outskirts of Paris.
Swedish golfer Jesper Svensson, the 54-hole leader who had been one stroke ahead of Bairstow and Olesen, closed with a 76 and tied for 27th.
Sunday’s win earned Bradbury spots at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and the World Tour Championship in Dubai.
“It hasn’t sunk in at all. The goal this week was to make the cut so I didn’t have to go to Korea (needing to) keep my card,” Bradbury said, adding: “I guess I’ll be looking at flights to Dubai then.”
AP photo by Thibault Camus / Dan Bradbury poses with his trophy Sunday after winning the Open de France at Le Golf National in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines near Paris.Victory at home
SHANGHAI — Ruoning Yin shot an 8-under 64 to win the LPGA Buick Shanghai tournament, the fourth career victory on the circuit for the Chinese golfer.
Yin trailed third-round leader Mao Saigo of Japan by one stroke, but she rallied with birdies on five of the final six holes. Yin finished at 25-under 263 in the 72-hole event at the Qizhong Garden Golf Club.
Saigo closed with a 71 and tied for second with Sei Young Kim of South Korea, who carded a 68. Saigo was looking for her first LPGA Tour victory. They were both six strokes off the lead.
Two of the LPGA’s top players — American star Nelly Korda, who is No. 1 in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings, and New Zealand’s Lydia Ko, who has been on a tear since midsummer — were not in the field at Shanghai, but both are entered in the BMW Ladies Championship that starts Thursday in South Korea.
Yealimi Noh of the United States closed with a 67 to finish fourth, one shot behind Kim and Saigo.