Hovland rallies from 6 back to win and deny Morikawa No. 1

NASSAU, Bahamas — The 24-year-old rising star put a nice ribbon on a three-win year in golf by posing with Tiger Woods at the trophy presentation Sunday in the Hero World Challenge.

It just wasn’t the winner anyone imagined.

Not even Viktor Hovland thought it was realistic that he could rally from six shots behind Collin Morikawa, the steady hand who was poised to reach No. 1 in the world with a victory.

Instead, the Norwegian did the unthinkable in a final round at Albany that was pure chaos.

He looked up from a greenside bunker on the ninth hole and saw Morikawa sliding fast with a pair of double bogeys. Hovland seized on the opportunity with back-to-back eagles and closed with a pair of bogeys he could afford for a 6-under 66 and a one-shot victory.

“I didn’t think a win was going to be very possible,” Hovland said. “But I know this course is tricky. You can make birdies, but it’s easy to make bogeys and doubles. If I put a good score up there, you never know what’s going to happen.”

Just about everything did.

On the same hole Hovland holed a bunker shot for eagle, Sam Burns went from a tie for the lead to a triple bogey when it took five shots to get up a slope from 15 yards away. Jordan Spieth and Henrik Stenson were penalized two shots for hitting shots off the 17th tee while playing the ninth hole. Scottie Scheffler was seven shots behind, made a triple bogey on his fourth hole and still nearly won.

The biggest surprise was Morikawa — Hovland’s roommate for the week at Albany — who took a fiveshot lead into the final round and wasn’t even a serious factor over the final hour. Two double bogeys and a 41 on the front nine sent him to a 76.

“A little sad to see him not play his best today,” Hovland said. “He’s a great player and I expected him to just kind of roll away with the victory. But sometimes this sport is not that easy and I’m sure he’ll come back even stronger.”

Ultimately, this was about the other 24-year-old adding to his big year after wins in Germany on the European Tour and Mexico on the PGA Tour. His third win of the year against a 20-man elite field moved him to No. 7 in the world.

Morikawa, the British Open champion and first American to be No. 1 on the European Tour and newly engaged as of Tuesday, looked like he would breeze to a fourth win of the year in the Bahamas.

But he missed three birdie chances from 10 feet or closer at the start of the round and then went sideways when his approach on No. 4 sailed into a big bush and led to double bogey, and the same thing happened — presumably with mud on the ball — at the par-5 sixth for another double bogey. A chunked wedge on the par-5 ninth led to bogey.