Brooks Koepka shot a scintillating 67 to claim the fifth major of his career at the PGA Championship at Oak Hill on Sunday, on what was also a decent tournament for the Irish.
Koepka won a last day duel with Norwegian Viktor Hovland to finish on nine-under par. He becomes the first LIV golfer to win a major since the foundation of the breakaway tour.
After claiming his third PGA Championship, Koepka spoke of how he learned from failures, especially at The Masters last month where he lead the tournament only to be tracked down by Jon Rahm.
I think failure is how you learn. You get better from it. You realize what mistakes you've made. Each time I've kind of made an adjustment. It's more mentality than it is anything. It's not really golf swing or anything like that. You're going to play how you play, but mentally you can kind of figure things out, and I'm always trying to get better. Just trying to find that different little edge just to poke and try inside my head.
Best of the Irish at the 2023 PGA Championship
Rory McIlroy's final round was a rollercoaster ride but he finished on 69 for the third consecutive round to finish in a tie for 7th on -2.
Buoyed by an eagle on the 15th hole, Shane Lowry battled back on the back 9 to finish in a tie for 12th and at even par for the tournament.
Padraig Harrington was the third Irishman to shoot 69 yesterday and finished in a tie for 50th place, finishing on 7 over par.
McIlroy earned $555,000 for his weekend's work. Lowry brought home $365,000 while Harrington earned $37,265.
Here's what the top finishers took from a prize purse over $17m.
1. Brooks Koepka, -9, $3,150,000
T2: Viktor Hovland, -7, $1,540,000
T2: Scottie Scheffler, -7, $1,540,000
T4: Cam Davis, -3, $720,000
T4: Kurt Kitayama, -3, $720,000
T4: Bryson DeChambeau, -3, $720,000
T7: Sepp Straka, -2, $555,000
T7: Rory McIlroy, -2, $555,000
T9: Patrick Cantlay, -1, $465,000
T9: Cameron Smith, -1, $465,000
T9: Justin Rose, -1, $465,000
T12: Shane Lowry, E, $365,000
McIlroy visibly struggled all week and arrived to the tournament with an illness. Still it was a battling performance and an impressive top 10 finish considering the disaster at Augusta last month.
After the round McIlroy spoke of his changed mentality.
I was more accepting of things out there, and I think it's hard. Like the previous major championship at Augusta, all I think about is winning, winning, winning, to try to win that green jacket, and you know, I sort of -- I then don't really think about just playing a tournament and the cadence that goes along with getting into rounds and whatever.
I go to the second tee on Friday morning or Friday afternoon, and I see I'm already ten back of Brooks or whatever. So then I'm thinking, oh, geez, I have no chance of winning, and things sort of crumble. It's just like being a bit mentally fragile because you're so focused on the one thing you're trying to do when, in essence, you just need to play a golf tournament and see where the chips fall at the end of the week.
The third major of the year will take place in Los Angeles, when the US Open tees off at LA CC on June 15.
