Scottie Scheffler wins Memorial Tournament for fifth victory in 8 starts

He’s won at Arnold Palmer’s place. He’s won at the home of the PGA Tour. He ran away with a win at Augusta, and he won a week later in Hilton Head.

Scottie Scheffler was already the top golfer in the world, but Sunday he drove that point even further with a win at the Memorial Tournament — Jack Nicklaus’ signature event — for his fifth win in eight starts.

On a challenging Muirfield Village course with only five players playing Sunday under par, Scheffler held off runs by Collin Morikawa and Adam Hadwin to shoot a final round 74 and beat Morikawa by one stroke.

The win makes Scheffler the first golfer to win five PGA Tour events in a single season since Justin Thomas in 2017, and we’re only in June with two majors and the FedEx Cup Playoffs to go. And all five wins were in signature events: the Masters, the Players Championship, the Arnold Palmer Invitational, the RBC Heritage and now the Memorial.

Scheffler entered Sunday with a four-shot lead over Morikawa and the rest of the field. As the course played so fast and firm, Scheffler played the front nine over par while the Canadian Hadwin made a strong push to get within one shot.

Morikawa also spent much of the back nine within one, but while so much of the field fell back, Scheffler remained steady. Despite missing seven of his first 11 fairways Sunday, he parred eight straight holes to never concede the lead.

Scheffler even bogeyed the 17th hole to give Morikawa an opportunity to tie on 18. Scheffler’s approach shot then took a hard bounce off the green and into the rough, but Morikawa found that same rough behind the pin.

Scheffler had to sink a five-foot putt for par to win, and he was able to grab the victory with an emotional fist pump.

Big win. Big fist pump.

🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆 pic.twitter.com/Q6jydEACll

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 9, 2024

The tight finish represents another tough second-place result for Morikawa, the two-time major winner having his best season since his 2021 campaign but coming up short multiple times. He was in the final pairing at both the Masters and PGA Championship this spring yet finished seven and six shots back of the winner at both, respectively.

He also entered Sunday at the RBC Heritage two back of Scheffler only to end up six back.

Scheffler is currently a 3-to-1 betting favorite at next week’s U.S. Open at Pinehurst as he’s becoming the sport’s biggest favorite since Tiger Woods’ heyday in 2010.

Required reading

(Photo: Michael Reaves / Getty Images)