Brooke Henderson drained a three-foot birdie putt to edge Lydia Ko on the first playoff hole to win the 2016 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship on Sunday afternoon at Sahalee Country Club in Sammamish, Washington.
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The 18-year-old Canadian trailed Ko by two shots heading into the final round but a six-under-par round of 65 pulled her into contention and she then kept her nerve as they replayed the 18th hole to land the tournament at Sahalee Country Club.
Ko may have the “youngest ever to win a major” category sewn up, but Henderson became the youngest to capture the Women’s PGA (the former “LPGA Championship”).
Henderson hit a superb approach on No. 18 as her ball landed about 20 feet inside of Ko’s ball and just three feet from the cup.
Wielding a hot putter, Henderson rolled in a 90-foot eagle from off the green at the par-five 11th as she came home in 31.
Jutanugarn made a good stretch run with birdies at the 16th and 17th holes, but her birdie putt at the last hole to get into the playoff missed, leaving her bogey-free on the day at 5-under-par 66.
Ko answered with a birdie at the 11th, but Henderson drew another huge roar with a birdie at the 13th to stay one shot behind.
Asked on Monday if her entrance into the pro ranks, where there are an embarrassment of instructors and coaches and training tools touting an equal amount of techniques, had changed her approach, Henderson responded that, no, it was “very much the same”.
Henderson celebrated with some quick Mexican food and made her way through more than 85 congratulatory messages on her phone. “And she won it at 15, so she kind of put things in perspective, and opened my eyes that many things are possible, just to believe and push yourself to be better”. Just the same, she sensed something special was going to happen.
In regulation, Henderson saved par on 18 with a 12-footer, moments before Ko missed a 4-foot birdie try on the par-3 17th.
“Majors are what define careers”, said Post, whose victory made her the youngest woman to win a major until Ko broke the mark nearly five decades later. A series of nervy putts allowed Weir to catch the American before he headed up 18 needing a par to force a playoff. But Henderson played the back nine at Sahalee, a notoriously hard course in Seattle, at 4-under par, and closed with a 6-under par 65, a remarkable score under hard circumstances.
Ko topped the leaderboard coming into Sunday, with Henderson sitting sixth, three strokes behind. She won that event as her first LPGA title as a 17-year-old last year.
“I’m thrilled for many things”, she said. In the first of his victories, in 1968, Morris faced just 11 other players and the format consisted of three nine-hole loops in one day. And Henderson managed to make par on the 18th the first time despite pushing her tee shot in the trees down the right side.
She won the Kia Classic in March and followed that success with her ANA major win in the next tournament in a year when she has not finished outside the top 25 in any of her appearances.
So I know that I played solid. “I didn’t feel it was a bad stroke”.
But no one was better than Henderson, who was the first-round leader after a 67 before shooting consecutive rounds of 73.
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Henderson has been looking up to Ko for a while, using her for motivation.
