Johnson tops Matteson in Tour playoff
Zach Johnson won the John Deere Classic golf tournament on the second playoff hole Sunday in Silvis, Ill., hitting his second shot to a foot from the pin for a birdie to beat Troy Matteson. -Chapman
Compiled by John Tkach from staff, wire reports
Roger Chapman earned the right to be mentioned in the same sentence with Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and Hale Irwin.
Not bad for a self-described former European Tour journeyman.
The Englishman shot 4-under-par 66 on Sunday to win the U.S. Senior Open by two strokes at 10-underpar 270 at Indianwood in Lake Orion, Mich. He won the Senior PGA Championship by the same margin two months ago on the other side of Michigan.
Chapman, Nicklaus, Player and Irwin are the only players to win the U.S. Senior Open and Senior PGA Championship in the same year. “It’s a true honor,” Chapman said. Before this year, his career high- light was a European Tour win in Brazil in 2000.
Bernhard Langer (72), Fred Funk (67), Tom Lehman (68) and Corey Pavin (68) finished tied for second at 8-under 272 in the Champions Tour’s fourth of five majors. Pavin’s two-stroke penalty after his first round for hitting a ball that moved a fraction of an inch proved to be costly.
Entering the final round, it seemed as if the only lingering question was how easily Langer would win.
Langer, though, found out what the first- and second-round leaders — Tom Kite and Lance Ten Broeck — did the previous two days: It’s not easy to stay consistent at Indianwood.
Langer took a four-shot lead into the final round and closed with a shaky performance that spoiled his shot at winning his second U.S. Senior Open.
The wind picked up considerably Sunday — with gusts up to 20 mph — and made it even tougher to keep tee shots on the unforgiving and tight fairways and to accurately approach hard, undulating greens.
Chapman answered the challenge for much of the day with two birdies on the front nine and four through 14 holes. He chunked a shot out of the bunker at 16, leading to a bogey that he made up for on the next hole.
Chapman, 53, stepped to the potentially pivotal 195-yard, par-3 17th and calmly hit a 5-iron shot that was close enough for a tap-in birdie that restored a two-shot lead.
“I have to say that was my best shot ever played,” he said.
Player was the first to win the U.S. Senior Open and Senior PGA Championship in the same year back in 1987. Nicklaus did it in 1991, and Irwin pulled off the feat in 1998.