San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Davis Riley now on the verge of winning PGA Tour card.
Lining up a 95-yard wedge shot on the final hole of the tournament, Davis Riley tried to control his breathing.
He hadn’t paid much attention to the scores until the 15th hole, but since then he’d asked his caddie for an update two or three times between each shot.
Holding a one-stroke lead as part of the final group with his closest competition already in the clubhouse, Riley needed only to calm his nerves and put an approach shot on the green to have two putts for the win.
When his wedge landed about 2 feet from the cup, Riley’s apprehension melted. As he stood on the green waiting for the others in his group to finish, he casually paced the grass, leaned against his putter and glanced around at the scenery.
“I knew at that point I had two putts to win, so it was kind of stress free,” Riley said. “Hopefully, I can two-putt from 2 feet.”
Riley only needed one putt, draining a birdie to bring him to 5-under for the round and 16-under for the tournament, earning a two-stroke victory Saturday in the Korn Ferry Tour’s TPC San Antonio Championship at the Oaks.
When the ball landed in the cup, Riley knew he was just one win away from automatic promotion to the PGA Tour, having already banked a first-place finish at the Panama Championship in February.
“I really try to just let myself make sense of not thinking forward about that, but really just be in the present,” Riley said. “If I
take care of what’s at hand, I believe I will get three wins.”
With the Korn Ferry Tour merging the 2020 and 2021 seasons as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, Riley has nine events this year and all of next year to claim the third victory.
He knows the goal will be talked about at each tournament he enters, but the 23-year-old in his second pro season said he’s learned the value of remaining “in the moment.”
“I’ll have to do a good job of just focusing on what I’m doing and not paying too much attention to what’s going on on social media, Twitter, or whatever,” Riley said.
The win vaults Riley from third to first in the Korn Ferry Tour points standings, supplanting his roommate, Will Zalatoris.
Riley said he was standing on the 18th hole two weeks ago when Zalatoris finished off a win at the TPC Colorado Championship at Heron Lakes. Celebrating Zalatoris’
victory at their home golf club in Dallas made Riley want to recapture that feeling himself.
“I know his goal is three wins, too. There’s no doubt about that,” Riley said. “We play a lot of golf together, and it’s nice to have somebody who is just as good or even better than you pushing you day in and day out. It’s a lot of fun.”
Riley called on memories from Panama during Saturday’s final round to build a sense of calm and confidence.
He said he “blacked out for a second” on the 16th hole, when he hit a 200-yard 8-iron shot within 2 feet of the cup, setting up a birdie that allowed him to carry the lead to the 18th tee.
“I just was running off adrenaline after that,” Riley said. “It was nice to finish like that.”
Riley came in two shots ahead of Taylor Pendrith and Paul Barjon, a 27-year-old TCU product from France whose PGA Tour bio lists Tony Parker and the Spurs among his favorite athletes and teams.
As Pendrith was preparing to compete in the tournament this week, he perused the yardage books of reigning Valero Texas Open champion Corey Conners, who won the event on the Oaks course last April as a Monday qualifier.
Pendrith said he was the best man at Conners’ wedding. The two were roommates for four
years at Kent State, and Pendrith has been staying at Conners’ home in Florida as the Korn Ferry Tour returns to play. He and Conners exchanged a few texts through the week about the layout of the Oaks course.
“I know it played a lot different, but it was pretty cool to see him win there, and it would’ve been nice for me to get the job done,” Pendrith said. “I came up a little short, but overall, a good week.”
Saturday’s final round signaled the end of two weeks of Korn Ferry Tour events at TPC San Antonio, marking the first professional sports in the Alamo City since widespread shutdowns in March in response to the pandemic.
Before presenting Riley with the trophy, tournament director Darren Nelson thanked TPC San Antonio and general manager Matt Flory for their hospitality.
“You guys were rock stars,” Nelson said. “It was a first-class operation from A to Z around here.”