OLYMPIA FIELDS, Ill. — Viktor Hovland kept hitting every shot just the way he wanted on the back nine at Olympia Fields Country Club. Rory McIlroy was keeping his card and kept writing “3” in just about every box.
Hovland delivered the best round of his PGA Tour career at just the right time Sunday, turning a two-man race into a one-man show by breaking the North Course record with a 9-under-par 61 to surge past American star Scottie Scheffler and England’s Matt Fitzpatrick to win the BMW Championship.
The previous mark of 62 was set and matched during the tournament on the rain-softened layout, by Max Homa on Friday and Sam Burns on Saturday. Hovland was so close to perfection that he birdied all but two holes on the back nine.
“When I made the putt on 15 for birdie, I felt like, ‘OK, we’ve got a chance now if I can finish pretty well,'” Hovland said. “Then you never know what’s going to happen behind you.”
What happened behind him was nothing special. Scheffler holed enough putts to lead by two at one point, but he missed the ones that really mattered: six feet for birdie on the par-3 16th to stay with Hovland, and then a three-putt from 20 feet on the 17th for bogey.