Thomas down 7 strokes, rallies for playoff victory

TULSA — Justin Thomas didn’t pay attention to any score but his own Sunday in the PGA Championship, knowing he was seven shots behind but with only six players ahead of him on a Southern Hills course where anything could happen.

He never could have dreamed how it all played out, a chaotic final hour of pressure moments, clutch putts and unimaginable heartache for Mito Pereira.

Thomas hit a shank on the sixth hole. He made a 65-foot birdie putt that began his record-tying comeback. He missed a 10-foot birdie putt on the final hole that he feared would cost him. He never led until one hole remained in his three-hole aggregate playoff with Will Zalatoris.

And when Thomas tapped in for par to capture another PGA Championship title, he stood erect on the 18th green with a mixture of joy and disbelief.

“I was asked early in the week what lead is safe and I said, ‘No lead,’ ” Thomas said. “I can’t believe I found myself in a playoff.”

Thomas closed with a 3-under 67 that turned out to be enough for a playoff when Pereira, the 27-year-old from Chile in his first PGA Championship who never trailed all day, drove into a creek and made double bogey on the 18th hole to finish one shot behind.

It was the first time since Phil Mickelson at Winged Foot in the 2006 U.S. Open that a player gave away a oneshot lead on the final hole to lose a major.

“Sad to hit it in the water,” Pereira said. “I mean, I wish I could do it again.”

Just like his first PGA title at Quail Hollow in 2017, the signature shot for Thomas came on the 17th hole. It was the second hole of the aggregate playoff. He drilled a 3-wood on the 301-yard par 4 to 35 feet for a two-putt birdie, his first lead of the day.

Zalatoris, whose mustmake 8-footers for birdie and par on the final two holes of regulation got him into the playoff with a 71, couldn’t deliver in overtime. His 8-foot birdie putt on the 17th in the playoff missed, and he couldn’t catch Thomas at the end.

Zalatoris looked like he had thrown away his chances for a first major — and first PGA Tour victory — when he three-putted from just outside 20 feet on the 16th hole. But he responded with a birdie from the bunker at the 17th and holed an 8-foot par putt on the 18th for a 71.

He joined Thomas at 5-under 275, and they played on when Pereira faltered.

Thomas, who had gone 14 months since his last victory at The Players Championship last year, now has a PGA Tour win in each of his last eight years and moves to No. 5 in the world.

His second major came when he least expected it.

None of the six players ahead of him had ever won a major. Thomas knew that. He was in the longest drought since his first PGA Tour title. He was aware of that, too.

“I remember how tough it is now to win, so I knew I was going to be nervous and I knew they’d be feeling the ex- act same thing,” Thomas said. “You just don’t know what’s going to happen.”

John Mahaffey in the 1978 PGA Championship at Oakmont was the other player to come from seven shots behind on the final day. He also won in a playoff over Tom Watson and Jerry Pate.

Thomas was still seven shots behind when he made his remarkable run, a mixture of key birdies and keeping mistakes off his card. It started with an improbable birdie putt from just short of the green to a back pin on the par-3 11th. He edged closer with an 18-foot birdie on the next hole.

In eight majors at Southern Hills, it was first time a player rallied from any margin to win, and it was only the second playoff.

Six of the seven previous major champions at Southern Hills are in the World Golf Hall of Fame. The 29-yearold Thomas is surely headed there one day.