Gary D’Amato:
Koepka stayed steady, in the moment for victory.
TOWN OF ERIN – Brooks Koepka got a phone call from his buddy, Dustin Johnson, on Saturday night. Johnson wanted to pass on some pearls of wisdom about what it takes to win the U.S. Open.
Let’s just say they didn’t have to use their rollover minutes.
“Yeah, I mean, there’s probably not much that’s interesting, to be honest,” Koepka said when asked to recount their conversation. “It was a long phone call, for us. It was like two minutes.”
Like the laconic Johnson, Koepka won’t win any awards for extemporaneous speaking. On the golf course, he’s the opposite of excitable, the antithesis of emotional. But he does have a pulse.
“Did you see that fist pump there on 18?” he said.
Yes, we did. Definitely more Bernhard Langer than Tiger Woods.
But the U.S. Open trophy is engraved with the names of many men who played impassively, connected the dots, took it one shot at a time, never got ahead of themselves, stayed in the moment.
The latest is the 27-year-old Koepka, who pulled away from a pack to win Sunday at Erin Hills.
The 117th U.S. Open was headed for a NASCAR-type conclusion, with a bunch of
players headed to the finish line nose-to-bumper, all of them trying not to hit the wall or run out of gas.
Then Koepka ended the suspense, making three consecutive birdies down the stretch in a lap-the-field performance that showcased his extra gear off the tee and his nerve behind the wheel.
He shot a 67 and finished with a 16-under-par 272 total, tying the 72hole U.S. Open scoring record set by Rory McIlroy at Congressional in 2011.
Koepka won by four strokes over third-round leader Brian Harman and Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama, who closed with a 66, low round of the day.
“I played really solid from the moment we got here on Monday and all the way through until today,” Koepka said. “The ball-striking was pretty solid. It had to be today, especially with the wind. And I got on the roll with the putter there a little bit. So all around, my game is pretty solid and I couldn’t be happier.”
Erin Hills wasn’t the monster many thought it would be, thanks to a weeklong confluence of weather conditions — a lot of rain and little wind — that softened its greens and effectively widened its already generous fairways.
But when the wind finally howled out of the west-northwest Sunday morning, the course justified the United States Golf Association’s faith in it as a championship venue. Of the first 32 players to tee off, only four broke par and just one — Jordan Spieth, with a 69 — broke 70.
The wind died some in the afternoon, but not before Erin Hills bared its fangs.
“If we tighten fairways up and the wind blows like it did today, they’re going to be crying that it’s too hard and it’s too narrow and it’s unplayable,” said Dana Fry, one-third of the Erin Hills design team. “So you have to have it on that side so that it can handle 20, 25 mph winds.”
Harman started the day with a one-shot lead over Koepka, Justin Thomas and Tommy Fleetwood of England but could manage only an even-par 72. Fleetwood also shot a 72 and finished fourth alone at 277 and Thomas struggled to a 75 and tumbled to a tie for ninth.
“I don’t believe in moral victories,” Harman said of his runnerup finish. “I had an opportunity today and I didn’t get it done. But at the same time, I don’t feel as though I lost a golf tournament. I think Brooks went out and won the tournament.”
Koepka did it with superior ball-striking. He led the field in greens in regulation at 86.1%, an astounding percentage. He mashed it off the tee, averaging 322.1 yards. He hit the longest drive of the day on the 18th hole Sunday, a 379-yard blast. And he finished fourth in fairways hit (49 of 56).
That’s a lethal combination at a U.S. Open.
“I feel like I can strike it pretty well,” Koepka said. “I control the spin. I drove the ball really well this week, so that really helps.”
He took control of the championship with three consecutive birdies on Nos. 14-16 but said a 9foot par-saving putt on the par-3 13th – after he missed the green wide right – was “massive."
“I just built off that putt on 13,” he said. “I had some confidence.”
Koepka had a chance to get to 17-under and break McIlroy’s record but failed to get up-anddown for birdie from in front of the green on the par-5 18th.
He became the seventh consecutive firsttime major championship winner, a streak that dates to Jason Day and the 2015 PGA Championship at Whistling Straits.
“It feels amazing to get my name on this trophy with so many other great names,” he said. “It’s truly an honor."
Koepka had won just once on the PGA Tour, the 2015 Waste Management Phoenix Open, and considered himself an underachiever.
“I just felt like I should be winning more,” he said. “I’m not a big fan of losing. I don’t think anyone out here is. And I just couldn’t stand the fact that I’d only won once. … I think I can win multiple times a year. I really do. And I think this is hopefully major No. 1 and there’s many more to come.”
In all the post-round excitement, Koepka noted that he hadn’t gotten a Father’s Day card for his father, Bob.
He smiled and looked at the trophy.
“I really hope this works,” he said.