KAPALUA, Maui >> Ernie Els is the king of the Tournament of Champions and the Sony Open in Hawaii with combined career earnings of $5.2 million. But don’t expect Justin Thomas to say, “Long live the king.”
His hard-earned victory in Sunday’s strange three-hole playoff over fellow past TOC winners Patrick Reed and Xander Schauffele is his 12th PGA Tour win, the most of any current player under the age of 30. He joins Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods as the only golfers to have a dozen or more victories on tour before the age of 27. Woods won 34 events by that age and Nicklaus 20.
And while he hasn’t surpassed Els’ mark for the most money won here in the island chain’s two tour events, he’s closing fast. Entering this week’s Sony Open at Waialae Country Club, where he once shot a 59, Thomas has now pocketed $4.64 million. It’s only a matter of time before Thomas wears the crown.
But this first-place check of $1.34 million wasn’t easy. He did his best to give it away several times in Sunday’s stretch drive to Reed and Schauffele — they just wouldn’t take it. Blame some of it on the elements. Like everyone else on the course, he battled strong tradewinds that ruffled his shirt and plastered his pants from tee to green, from the first hole until the last.
Schauffele began the day with a one-shot lead over Thomas and wound up the first one out at the opening playoff hole. While he struggled when it counted most, Reed shot the best final round with a 7-under 66 to join Thomas and Schauffele at 14-under 278 for the tournament. Reed had his good days and his bad days for the week. He opened with a 72, followed it with a 66 and then carded a 74 on Saturday to put him four shots off the pace entering the closing 18. It proved to be a bridge too far.
Thomas had a bridge of his own to cross over the final three holes. Walking off the 15th tee with birdie, he was 16 under and held a two-shot advantage over his two closest competitors. Game, set and match, right? Wrong, bison breath. Thomas stumbled badly, bogeying two of the last three. And the one par he did manage at the 17th required a knee-knocking 7-footer or he would have been watching Schauffele and Reed heading back to the par-5 18th for a little overtime instead of joining them.
Even in the three-hole playoff, Thomas wasn’t exactly a pillar of strength. All three golfers took turns giving the show away before Thomas finally secured the victory with a 3-foot birdie putt in the dark. Had that lipped out somehow, they would have returned to the Plantation Course at 8 a.m. Monday to begin playoff hole No. 4 with little or no crowd to bear witness to the event.
Now Reed and Thomas turn their sights to the Sony, where the golf course is much easier to walk and where the winds rarely blow your socks off four consecutive rounds. Judging by how much the TOC took out of both golfers, being competitive in this week’s tour of duty may be an even bigger challenge than walking four rounds at the Plantation Course, which sits precariously on the side of a mountain.
Waialae is flatter than a bad joke and tighter than Jack Benny. You couldn’t ask for two more diametrically opposed golf courses, something that didn’t bother Els one bit. He was the first to win these two tournaments back-to-back, Thomas the second. But Els never did it twice, something Thomas can tackle come Thursday.
Long live the king.
