Playoff title When McIlroy last won the Deutsche Bank championship in 2012, he brought that momentum with him to also claim the BMW championship the following week before being usurped by Brandt Snedeker in the Tour Championship and also for the megabucks bonus.
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Casey, who began the day with a three-shot lead on 15 under, had to settle for second after carding a two-over-par 73. He went so far to tweak his grip a bit before Saturday’s second round and proceeded to only need 25 that day.
He played the next 15 holes in 4 under to get back to even par, which contributed mightily to his 20th victory worldwide.
McIlroy plays a brilliant bunker shot at the last hole to set up a tap-in birdie putt.
No, it was the force of nature known as Rory McIlroy – remember that wondrous phenomenon? – that took care of the Englishman’s hopes of winning his first event on the PGA Tour for seven long years.
“As I said, after three holes on Friday, there was so much going through my head, and none of those things involved sitting beside a trophy at the end of the week, so it’s just been incredible”.
He ended his round in style, hitting an exquisite bunker shot to within two feet at the par-five 18th for a tap-in four, his seventh birdie of the day, as he clinched his 12th USA tour victory.
Casey finished in second spot, one shot clear of Jimmy Walker in third. And, then, having recovered to make a charge over the weekend, McIlroy still went into the final round playing catch-up on Casey.
McIlroy bounced back brilliantly from a disastrous start in the first round on Friday. His return at the Barclays last week was tentative, five missed putts from inside five feet. I feel like I work hard on my putting, and he’s worked as hard as anybody in the past two weeks on his putting.
Up to fourth in the FedEx Cup, can Rory McIlroy now go on to win it?
Walker was within two of the lead when his drive bounced into the woods right of the 10th fairway and led to bogey, and Walker burned the edges of the cup with so many other birdie attempts. It hasn’t got a lot easier, not when the greatest player of this generation has his mojo back.
McIlroy has moved from fifth to third, pushing Jordan Spieth from third to fourth and Henrik Stenson from fourth to fifth.
World No. 1 Jason Day continued his climb up the leaderboard, closing with a 67 en route to a tie for 15th.
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Deutsche Bank gave him the blue belt with a large silver buckle when McIlroy won four years ago, and because this was the last year it is sponsoring the tournament, the company wanted him to keep it.
