With 18 holes to play on Sunday, May 22, Justin Thomas trailed Mito Pereira by seven shots seemingly all the way out of winning contention. Slowly but surely, Thomas started earning strokes back and, before he knew it, he was in a playoff to win the major.
The playoff, however, was played against Will Zalatoris who also trailed coming into Sunday. But in a strange twist, Zalatoris just had to play not as bad as Pereira did to make it, as Pereira shot five over par to fall to third.
In the playoff, Thomas made a birdie on hole two to secure the victory, his second PGA Championship. His performance is tied for the third-largest comeback in major tournament history, overcoming the seven-stroke deficit.
With his win, Thomas prevented the top four going into Sunday from capturing their first PGA Tour win. Pereira, Zalatoris, Matt Fitzpatrick, and Cameron Young would all have shocked the field had they come away with a major championship as their first career win; but Thomas had other ideas.
In an impressive display of consistency, Thomas shot 67 three times with a four over par 74 in the third round being the only blemish. He started off Sunday in a rough fashion, bogeying the third and sixth holes, but captured a birdie on the fifth and ninth holes to stop the bleeding.
The comeback would happen on the back nine as Thomas birdied three holes to bring him to five under. Sitting in the clubhouse, Thomas sat biting his nails as the leader Pereira finished his round. Going into the 18th hole, Pereira was six under par and held a one-shot lead.
His drive on 18 was a strange swing, almost a check, uncertain whether or not he was about to make contact. Scrambling to recover, Pereira tried to at least make a bogey and make the playoff, but was unable to do so, missing out by one stroke as he made a double bogey.
“I just think it’s so hard to win,” said Thomas. “I legitimately think it’s harder to win now than it was when I first came out on Tour.” Thomas didn’t allow for any easy first victories, but also didn’t make the win easy on himself.
The second major tournament of the year was also Tiger Woods’ second tour appearance in 2022. Much like the Master’s in April, Tiger was testing it out, seeing if it was possible to play and last after the injuries he sustained in a car wreck last February.
Woods did make the cut, and shot under par in one round. The pain was just too much, however, and Woods was forced to withdraw from the tournament.
He was not sure if he’d play in this tournament, setting his sights on wanting to play in the Open Championship in July. In such an admirable show of strength and courage, being able to even tee off in round one is a win in and of itself for Tiger at this stage.
Though the likelihood is he won’t win large again, they’ve said that in the past and we all know how that went down in 2018. After all, the major tournaments are where the best and brightest show their strut. The first two majors of 2022 have lived up to their billing and then some, and with two more to go, there’s no telling what is in store.
