Langer wins 7th senior major title
FLOURTOWN, Pa. — Bernhard Langer won the Constellation Senior Players Championship for the third straight year, holing a 12-foot birdie putt on the final hole Sunday for a one-stroke victory at windy Philadelphia Cricket Club.
The 58-year-old German star won his seventh senior major title his fifth in the last 11 majors to tie Hale Irwin for second place on the career list, a victory behind Jack Nicklaus.
Three strokes ahead at 2 under entering the round on the difficult Wissahickon Course, Langer closed with a 3-over 73 to finish at 1-over 281 the highest winning score in the history of the event first played in 1983. Mark O’Meara had the previous record at 7 under in 2010 at TPC Potomac in Maryland.
In contention this year at the Masters, Langer held off Miguel Angel Jimenez and Joe Durant, saving bogey with a 6-footer on the par-4 17th and getting his birdie putt to drop on the par-4 18th after it caught the edge and circled the cup. Jimenez and Durant each shot 68 for the low rounds of the day on the A.W. Tillinghast-designed course.
Langer won in 2014 at Fox Chapel in Pittsburgh and last year at Belmont in Massachusetts.
Langer has three victories this year, also winning the Chubb Classic in Florida in February and the major Regions Tradition last month in Alabama. The two-time Masters champion is third on the tour victory list with 28, one behind Lee Trevino. Irwin is the leader with 45.
ANOTHER EVENT
KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sammamish, Wash.: Brooke Henderson kept hearing the roar of fans echoing through the trees, leaving her to wonder what was happening elsewhere on the golf course.
By the end, all those roars were left just for her. And for good reason.
“The way the noise echoed here was really cool,” Henderson said. “I’d never experienced that before . ... And then a lot of those cheers ended up being for me, which was even cooler.”
Henderson won her first major title Sunday, beating top-ranked Lydia Ko with a birdie on the first hole of a playoff to win the Women’s PGA Championship after overcoming a three-shot deficit on the back nine.
The 18-year-old Canadian, ranked No. 4 in the world, closed with a bogey-free 6-under 65 the best round of the week at Sahalee Country Club to match Ko at 6-under 278. Ko finished with a 67.
In the playoff on the par-4 18th, Henderson hit her second shot a 7-iron from 155 yards to 3 feet, while Ko’s second from farther back in the fairway left her with 20 feet. Ko missed to the left, and Henderson tapped in to cap a week that started with a hole-in-one on her fourth hole Thursday and ended with a major championship.
Lyoness Open at Atzenbrugg, Austria: China’s Wu Ashun came from a stroke behind to win his second career European Tour title.
Wu, who also won the China Open last year, had a 69 including seven birdies to finish with a 13-under 275. He was one stroke clear of first-day leader Adrian Otaegui of Spain with Richard McEvoy of England another stroke back in third.