Villegas wins Tour Championship; Singh clinches FedEx Cup, $10 million
ATLANTA -- A two-putt par to win the Tour Championship in a playoff was worth an extra $1.5 million to Camilo Villegas.
A 7-iron to a scary pin on the 71st hole, under more pressure than he has ever faced?
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That was invaluable.
Villegas overcame a five-shot deficit with six birdies on his final 11 holes of regulation -- the last one after going at a dangerous flag on the 17th -- and won the Tour Championship on the first extra hole against Sergio Garcia for his second straight victory.
"Winning is awesome," Villegas said after closing with a 4-under 66.
The 26-year-old Colombian, who had gone 85 starts on the PGA Tour without winning, picked up his second in a row with a finish that brought the gallery to life on a sunny afternoon at East Lake.
In a four-man race coming to the final holes, Villegas caught Garcia with a 7-iron from 184 yards to 12 feet on the 17th, then twice hit beautiful lag putts from 45 feet for par on the 233-yard 18th - once in regulation to finish at 7-under 273, then in the playoff to win.
"Probably the shot of the tournament there," Villegas said. "There's a great chance the ball is going to plug if it comes up short in that bunker, and a yard long and it's in the water. So it's just hit and beg. It happened to be just fine."
Anthony Kim and Phil Mickelson each shot 69, and each had a chance to join the playoff. Kim, playing in the second-to-last group with Villegas, missed from 30 feet. In the final group, Mickelson missed his birdie putt from 20 feet.
Garcia, who blew a 54-hole lead of at least three shots for the third straight time, also had a 20-foot birdie putt to win in regulation. He didn't give himself much of a chance in the playoff when his 4-iron came up 30 yards short and to the right. His flop shot over a bunker stayed in the collar of the green, and a chip to extend the playoff came up well short.
"I doubted myself too much early on, and it cost me," said Garcia, who squandered a six-shot lead in 2005 at the Wachovia Championship and a three-shot lead last year in the British Open at Carnoustie.
The consolation prize might be the Vardon Trophy for lowest adjusted scoring average. Garcia came into the Tour Championship trailing Mickelson by one-hundredth of a point, and wound up at 69.40. Mickelson finished at 69.42.
Tiger Woods, who had season-ending knee surgery after winning the U.S. Open, did not play the required 60 rounds to be eligible for the award, which will not be official until the tour's Fall Series ends the first week of November.
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