Cam Davis wins Rocket Mortgage Classic

DETROIT – Kramer Hickok was standing greenside as Cam Davis, Troy Merritt and Joaquin Niemann began a sudden-death playoff at the Rocket Mortgage Classic on Sunday.

The charter flight to the John Deere Classic wouldn’t leave until things were decided, so there was nothing much to do but go out and take in some extra golf.

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“These guys have a long way to go before they equal what you did last week,” someone said.

Hickok smiled.

One week after Harris English needed eight playoff holes to beat Hickok at the Travelers Championship, Davis needed five to turn back Merritt, who missed a six-foot par putt at the par-3 15th hole to end it. It was the first PGA TOUR victory for Davis, a 26-year-old Australian who is married to an American and now makes his home in Seattle.

“It was a long playoff,” he said. “We did get close to last week, but just glad I finished the way I did.”

Niemann bogeyed the first playoff hole, the par-4 18th, to leave the stage to Davis and Merritt.

That Davis was even part of the playoff was something of a surprise. Merritt and Niemann, playing in the final twosome, looked to be the main protagonists here, but Davis kicked his round into overdrive on the last two holes of regulation. First he holed out for eagle from the sand on 17 – a miracle from 50 feet – and then with a birdie putt from just under 6 1/2 feet on 18.

He moved from 81st to 34th in the FedExCup.

“It's still so surreal for me,” he said. “I've been in some good positions before, but to play the golf that I played coming down the stretch was just awesome.”

Merritt, 35, was going for his third TOUR victory and was on the ropes for much of the playoff, salvaging pars to keep it going. Both he and Davis hit epic second shots over the water hazard in front of the green at the par-5 14th hole to set up two-putt birdies.

His tee shot at the par-3 15th, the fifth extra hole, was covering the flag but came up inches short and bounced backward into the rough, from which he failed to get up and down.

“Cam did what he had to do,” said Merritt, whose week included a hole-in-one Saturday. “He put it on the green every hole, had a chance to win five times, hit great putts and he just played fantastic. My hat's off to him. We gave it all we had, it was just not quite good enough.”

Davis’ biggest win prior to Sunday was the 2017 Australian Open, where he shot a final-round 64 to finish ahead of such stars as Jason Day and Jordan Spieth. But that was a case in which he finished well ahead of the leaders only to realize later that he’d won.

“This was much more stressful,” said Davis’ caddie, Andrew Tschudin, who is in his fourth year carrying Davis’ bag. “His best golf is fantastic; always knew he could be a TOUR winner.”

Davis joins Matt Jones (The Honda Classic) and Cameron Smith and Marc Leishman (Zurich Classic of New Orleans) as Australian winners on TOUR this season. With the victory, he also qualifies for the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational in Memphis next month.

It will be the first WGC start for Davis, who is now in the mix for the 2022 Presidents Cup.

It was apparent early that the course was ripe for the taking. Well back, Patton Kizzire had the day’s third tee time shot an 8-under 64 to zoom up the leaderboard (T25). Bubba Watson, who had contended at the previous week’s Travelers Championship before fading to a T19 finish, also came in with a 64 to reach 16 under par and briefly take the clubhouse lead.

Then came Alex Noren, who racked up nine birdies en route to his own 64. That got the 38-year-old Swede, who didn’t have a top-10 finish in 20 previous starts this season, to 17 under, knocking out Watson and freeing him up to fly home and watch fireworks with his family.

Davis’ sensational eagle-birdie finish in regulation also made plenty of noise. He’s known in America mostly for his height (6 feet, 4 inches) and, to a certain segment of golf fans, his uncanny ability to swing lefthanded. Neale Smith, his mental coach, said Davis tightened things up in his approach to every shot to take full advantage of his evident physical talents.

“He got a bit fried there a month ago and had a good three-week break,” Smith said. “I think that really made a difference in getting a nice reset. He came here and played nicely. His growth as a player has been very nice the last couple years. He’s got a big-time game that’s really going to show up on some of the bigger courses and in the bigger events.”

As for what exactly they’ve been working on, Smith said, “Macro would be a sense of calmness. Micro would be how to get in and out of shots better.”

No doubt the newest TOUR winner kept his calm in the tensest of circumstances.

“I hit some good putts, I hit some not-so-great putts,” Davis said before finding his way to the charter bound for the John Deere. “But I had a lot of opportunities and I guess that was eventually what got it over the line for me, good solid quality shots in important situations. I'm really proud of that and that's a testament to some of the hard work we've put in.”