October 22-25
Sherwood Country Club, Thousand Oaks, California
$8,000,000
Round 1, Round 2, Round 3

Patrick Cantlay started his final round in the Zozo Championship three shots behind overnight leader Justin Thomas and closed with a 7-under 65 to win his third PGA title by one shot.

“I put in a lot of work and try to do the right things all the time, so when it all does come together, it's really rewarding because it's all that hard work paying off."

Five birdies in his first nine holes put him in contention alongside Thomas and Jon Rahm who had been dueling for the title but four birdies between the 11th and 15th got him the lead where he stayed in spite of a bogey on the 16th.

Rahm had an opportunity to force a playoff at the 17th but narrowly missed a 15 foot putt, then a 20 foot putt on the final hole and closed with a 68.

Thomas made a few mistakes and only managed three birdies leaving him in need of an eagle on the 18th but only made birdie.

“You could say a lot of things, making one birdie my last 12 holes, shooting even par on the back nine, playing the par 5s 1 under. But I know I made a lot of really key putts when I felt like I needed to. But again, it just (stinks) when you're right there and you don't get it done.”

Reflecting on his performance Thomas said he will need to work on his focus before the Masters. Other players have talked about the difficulty of staying mentally sharp when playing without fans and Thomas felt the lack on Sunday.

“I've got to find a way to kind of just stay a little bit more focused out there. It's crazy, but sometimes it's hard to just kind of keep the killer instinct and stay in the zone when it's as quiet as it is out there. It's tough, but we're all dealing with it and I just have to find a little bit better way to cope with that.”

The other duel taking place at the other end of the leaderboard was between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.

Woods opened on Thursday with a 74 and seemed to recover with a 66 the next day but his 72 on Saturday and his final 74 confirm he has a lot of work to do before the Masters next month.

“I did not drive the ball and didn't hit my irons close enough consistently. The only thing I can take out of this week that I did positively, I feel like each and every day and pretty much every hole is, I putted well. I feel like I rolled it great. Unfortunately, most of them were for pars and a couple for bogeys here and there, but not enough for birdies.”

He is considering playing the Houston Open for the first time to get more practice.

“I'm not going to wait around on that decision and commit either way, one way or the other. We were talking about our progression and our training sessions and we'll be in the gym tomorrow afternoon and get back after it that way, but I'll make a decision quickly on whether or not I'm going to play Houston or not.”

Woods finished T72 (out of 77 players) at 1-under, 287 and still bested Mickelson by four shots. Mickelson, who won last week's PGA Tour Champions event, made five bogeys and three double bogeys on Sunday.