Weekend Wrap: Yang Takes Women's PGA
Longtime major contender breaks through at Sahalee. Plus, Scheffler wins Travelers in a playoff, several earn spots into The Open and history in The Amateur.
Amy Yang finally has her major.
After 75 tries, 21 top 10’s and 11 top 5’s and two runner-ups since debuting in 2006, Yang dominated the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club.
At 34, she is the oldest women’s major winner since 2018.
Yang opened up a seven-stroke lead at one point Sunday but a bogey at 16 was compounded by a group slow play warning at the 17th tee. There, Yang proceeded to make double bogey after hitting her tee shot into the fronting pond. But she never appeared unnerved by the sequence and a par at the 18th helped secure Yang’s three-stroke win over Jin Young Ko and Lilia Vu, last year’s two-time major champion.
“You know, at one point I thought will I every win a major championship before I retire, and I finally did it and it's just amazing,” Yang said.
She has been a non-factor in LPGA events since capturing last fall’s CME Group Tour Championship and its $2 million check. That triumph came after finishing T4 at 2023’s Chevron and the AIG Women’s British. But Yang came into this year’s Women’s PGA off two missed cuts and zero top 20’s in 2024.
The chances of a major breakthrough were growing slim at what’s an advanced age in the women’s game.
“I thought about this out on the golf course today, that golf is really just like a fight against myself,” Yang said. “I think I proved myself that I can compete and I can do this, yeah, so was a good learning week.”
A native of South Korea, Yang’s moved to Australia’s Gold Coast with her family at age 15 to advance a burgeoning golf career. She was the youngest winner on the Ladies European Tour at 16 years and 192 days and has been a steady presence on major leaderboards over the last 18 years.
Having shed corporate sponsorship on her bucket cap to reduce obligations and free-up time for interests that include rock climbing, Yang finally broke through on the obscenely narrow Sahalee. Seattle area crowds again turned out in force.
“It's been incredible all this week,” Yang said. “Everyone was rooting for me. I want to go sign some autographs for them. Like to thank them for all the support, and that gave me a lot of good positive vibes out there.”
Also…
Lilia Vu’s T2 came in her first major appearance since winning last year’s AIG Women’s Open. “I think if I didn't have my first round 3-over, then I would be in a pretty good spot now,” she said. “It's just high stakes, high pressure, and wasn't able to do anything about it. Pretty proud of my first major back coming out of an injury.”
Lexi Thompson opened Sunday’s final round with a 43 and closed with 31 to finish T9. Thompson birdied six of the last 10 holes she played.
A day after opening the championship with a 69, Nelly Korda posted 81 for her third straight missed cut and second straight major championship disappointment. The Chevron Championship winner bogeyed her first four holes, opened with 42, hit a second shot out of bounds at the 15th and appeared in tears at one point during her final holes. “A lot went my way at the beginning part of the year and just giving it back,” she told a group of reporters after the round.
Scheffler Wins Another Signature Event
Trailing by one after rounds of 65-64-64; Scottie Scheffler fought off Tom Kim, tricky final round winds, and six climate protestors to capture the Travelers Championship.
The finish was marred by the organized protesters rushing the 18th green before Scheffler and Kim’s final hole birdie putts. After a delay to detain the protestors and repair the green, Kim made a dramatic 10’4” birdie putt to force a playoff.
In sudden death, the PGA Tour moved the hole to get away from the area damaged by the protest. Once the powder had settled, Kim underclubbed his approach and found his ball buried in the greenside bunker. Scheffler was able to coax his putt to the hole for par and earn his sixth win in 2024, which includes an astonishing collection of prestige titles: The Masters, Players, and three other “signature” events (Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, RBC Heritage, the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday).
According to CBS’s Jim Nantz, Scheffler is the first to have six wins by July 1st since Arnold Palmer in 1962.
With the event moving up tee times Sunday due to possible storms in the forecast, Scheffler, Kim and Akshay Bhatia went out as a three-ball.
Scheffler and Kim started the week off eating pizza together and they regularly play golf in Dallas.
“He's one of my good buddies,” Scheffler said. “It's always fun competing against your friends, but it's also really tough. I feel for him there in the playoff, but I told him he's a great player and a great champion and I'm proud of him and the putt on 18 was pretty sweet and I'm sure that's something that he'll remember for a long time.”
The two were chatting throughout the round and even as the protest disruption took time to sort out.
“We were able to sit there and kind of relax each other,” Scheffler said. “Because you don't really know what's going on, you don't really understand the situation, you don't really -- there's people running around everywhere and you don't really know what's going to happen. So it was a bit confusing.
“Fortunately, the police did a great job of getting everything in order very quickly. I don't know how quick it was, but it seemed really fast to us. So we're very thankful for them.”
As for the protestors, the PGA Tour and golf world got an important security wake-up call. Things could have been much worse given how exposed the players were to non-violent protestors wielding colored powders. The group identified themselves as “Extinction Rebellion,” who had a heavy metal Top 100 hit in 1991 were attempting to highlight climate change issues and golf. Apparently, they didn’t want to go to Nashville, where that tour is funded by Saudi Arabia.
“I don't know what they had, but they left a lot of marks on the greens, which is not right for us players, especially when two guys are trying to win a golf tournament,” Kim said after the playoff loss. “But I'm very grateful for the Tour and the Tour security for handling that really well and making us players feel a lot safer.”
The scene from CBS’s drone shot as one of the protestors ran into the greenside bunker spreading a white substance:
Another can of red dye substance came frighteningly close to Scheffler:
The protest was well organized, with multiple participants, one filming what CBS did not show and a press release sent to golf writers not long after the incident.