Ortiz wins by two strokes for first PGA Tour victory

HOUSTON — Carlos Ortiz never doubted he could win any tournament no matter who he was facing, even if he didn’t have the trophies or the pedigree to prove it. Now he does.

Ortiz holed two long birdie putts from off the green to take the lead, then was rock solid down the stretch and delivered the winning shots for a 5-under 65 and a twoshot victory in the Houston Open.

Ortiz played the final round alongside a former No. 1 player in Jason Day. He spent the back nine locked in a battle with the current No. 1, Dustin Johnson.

He pulled ahead for good with a 6-iron so good the 29-year-old Mexican started walking after it on the par-5 16th. Ortiz had to settle for a two-putt birdie from 8 feet and he finished in style with a 20-foot birdie for a two-shot victory over Johnson and Hideki Matsuyama.

“I wasn’t really thinking about the other guys. I wasn’t worried,” Ortiz said. “I knew if I played good I was going to be hard to beat. … I knew I was capable of doing that because I know myself, but obviously validating that and then showing it, it definitely gets me more confidence. I’m just happy the way it played out.”

Ortiz, a three-time winner on what was then the Web. com Tour in 2014, became the first Mexican to win on the PGA Tour since Victor Regalado in 1978 at the Quad Cities Open.

Ortiz held back tears as he waited for his playing partners to putt. The victory sends him to the Masters next April. He was there a year ago to watch his brother, Alvaro, who qualified by winning the Latin American Amateur.

“It feels awesome,” said Ortiz, who grew up in Guadalajara and played at North Texas with Sebastian Munoz of Colombia, the most recent Latin American winner on tour. “This is like my second home. There was a bunch of people cheering for me, Latinos and Texans. I’m thankful for all of them.”

Ortiz finished at 13-under 267

Austin Cook (Jonesboro/ Arkansas Razorbacks) finished tied for 24th at 3 under.

CHAMPIONS Nothing settled yet

PHOENIX — The PGA Tour Champions season will last at least another day.

The final round of the season-ending Charles Schwab Cup Championship will be played today after Kevin Sutherland and Paul Broadhurst traded pars through six playoff holes in near darkness.

Broadhurst played a superb final round on Sunday, erasing a six-shot deficit with a bogey-free 63 in the season finale for the over-50 tour, which won’t crown a champion until next year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Sutherland stumbled through the early part of the round to lose an overnight five-shot lead over Wes Short Jr., but closed with a birdie on the par-5 18th hole to shoot a 2-under 69.

Broadhurst and Sutherland finished at 15-under 198.

After all those birdies, neither could get anything to fall in the playoff.

Trading missed birdie putts as the sun raced toward the horizon, Sutherland and Broadhurst kept agreeing to keep playing, not wanting the tournament to push into today.

They finally agreed to call it when Broadhurst missed an 8-foot birdie putt on No. 18 and Sutherland dropped in a 4-footer for par.

Glen Day (Little Rock) shot a 5-under 66 on Sunday and finished in a tie for fifth place. Ken Duke . (Arkadelphia, Henderson State) tied for 16th at 6 under. John Daly (Dardanelle, Arkansas Razorbacks) withdrew from the tournament after playing his eighth hole Sunday.

EUROPEAN MacIntyre wins

PAPHOS, Cyprus — Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre produced a brilliant finish to claim his first European Tour title in the Cyprus Showdown on Sunday.

MacIntyre birdied four of his last six holes at Aphrodite Hills Resort to card a 7-under 64 and finish a shot ahead of Japan’s Masahiro Kawamura.