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Collins has year’s best effort at Honda Classic
Cloverdale native finishes in six-way tie for fourth
PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. — Chad Collins of Cloverdale had his best finish of the season on the Professional Golfers Association tour, shooting a 69 on Sunday to finish in a six-way tie for fourth place in the Honda Classic.
Collins carded a 70 in Thursday’s first round, then shot back-to-back 67s in the second and third rounds.
The win earned Collins and each of the other five golfers who tied for fourth — Jhonattan Vegas, Billy Herschel, Wesley Bryan, Martin Kaymer and Tyrrell Hatton — a $232,000 payday.
Collins had played in nine previous events on the 2016-17 tour, which began in October. He had only made the cut after two rounds in two of those events, finishing tied for 50th at the Sanderson Farms Championship and tied for 63rd at the Waste Management Phoenix Open.
Champion Rickie Fowler made it interesting Sunday for as long as it took him to make two big putts to pull away.
Staked to a four-shot lead, Fowler hit one putt into a sprinkler hole, hit a tee shot into the water and watched a big lead shrink to one over Gary Woodland early on the back nine. Fowler answered with consecutive birdie putts of 40 and 25 feet and closed with a 1-over 71 for a four-shot victory.
“If I don’t make those putts, I’ve got a pretty tight race,” Fowler said.
Instead, those chasing him had the biggest problems with the closing stretch at PGA National.
Fowler effectively ended it with a shot over the water to the 3 feet that stretched his lead to five shots with two holes to play.
Woodland appeared to have second place wrapped up until he three-putted the 17th, and then tried to lay up on the par-5 18th and came up short into the water.
PGA champion Jimmy Walker was lurking on the fringe of contention until tee shots into the water on the 15th and 17th holes, which cost him five shots.
Hatton of England, who played in the final group in his first PGA Tour event in Florida, was out of the picture quickly.
He still had a chance to finish alone in second, which would have gone a long way toward securing a PGA Tour card, until missing a 3-foot birdie putt on the 17th.