The Ulsterman, playing as his usual brilliant tee-to-green self (third in strokes gained from tee to green for the week), fired furious rounds of 66 and 65 to close out the Deutsche Bank Championship.
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Rory McIlroy high-fives some young fans during the final round.
NORTON, Mass. – In the 477 days between Rory McIlroy’s last PGA Tour victory and his ultra-impressive, come-from-behind triumph at the Deutsche Bank Championship on Monday afternoon, he’s been the subject of massive critical analysis.
“It’s unbelievable in this game how things can change so quickly”, McIlroy said.
McIlroy played the final 69 holes in 19 under par.
McIlroy’s first PGA Tour win since the Wells Fargo tournament last May has added intrigue to the final two events of the FedEx Cup race with four of the World’s top six players ranked in the top five.
McIlroy actually got off to an egregious start on Friday in the first round by making making a bogey and a triple bogey in his first three holes to fall way off the lead.
Casey hit 7-iron into 5 feet for birdie on the par-3 16th, and then he drilled a 3-iron into the swirling wind on the par-5 18th that worked out perfectly.
The world number five has won the latest PGA Tour playoff event, the Deutsche Bank Championship in Boston, by two shots.
Casey needed an eagle at No. 18 to tie McIlroy after his par at No. 17, but missed a 58-foot putt that would have forced a playoff and parred the hole.
That is now in his sights, as is the overall FedEx Cup, with its bonus pool of $10m for the champion.
World No 1 Jason Day had 67 to finish 8-under while the remaining two Australians in the field, Marc Leishman (67) and Aaron Baddeley (75), have scraped into the third round of the play-offs, the BMW Championship at Crooked Stick in IN, by virtue of being in the top 70.
The top 70 players on the FedExCup points list advance to this week’s BMW Championship in Carmel, Indiana, where the leading 30 will qualify for the September 22-25 Tour Championship finale in Atlanta. He was tied for 11th, which at the moment is just enough for him to sneak into the top 70.
On a day when windy conditions caused by Tropical Storm Hermine dictated play and forced Deutsche Bank officials to move up tee times for the final round, sending players out in threesomes and having them start from both the front and back nine, the real force of nature was McIlroy.
He fell out of the “Big 3” conversation earlier this year when Dustin Johnson won the U.S. Open, Henrik Stenson won the British Open, and McIlroy kept sliding, largely because of his putting.
Regardless, it was also a monumental week for McIlroy with the putter.
He got into his stride with a birdie at the second and picked up further shots at the fourth, seventh, eighth and ninth to reach the turn in 31. And because of the wind, no one appeared to be running away with it.
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McIlroy carded seven birdies and just one bogey to move to 15-under for the tournament, while Casey failed to reproduce the form that saw him take a substantial lead into the final round. Kevin Chappell and Ryan Moore fell back with bogeys on the back nine.
