Flawless Cameron Champ claims 3M Open title

Nothing about this PGA TOUR season has been easy for Cameron Champ. Eleven missed cuts delivered doubts and some heavy self-introspection for the 26-year-old. So why would winning again ever be easy?

RELATED:Final leaderboard |What's in Champ's bag?

Champ, a young man with abundant power and promise, appeared to be in the midst of making a complete mess of the par-5 closing hole of the 3M Open at TPC Twin Cities. After wearing out his 2-iron off the tees through most of the second-nine holes, Champ pulled driver from the bag at 18 – he said he was adhering to his week’s game plan – and ripped a tee shot so far left it nearly reached the Dakotas. And there is where Cameron Champ’s most excellent adventure began.

There was a punch out from knee-high hay with his ball sitting 4 inches high that didn’t reach the fairway, a layup from the primary rough … and then one of the gap wedges of his lifetime, a towering shot from 127 yards that landed just beyond the flagstick at TPC Twin Cities’ harrowing, water-guarded closer, then spun to 3 feet from the flagstick. Deep breath, everyone. It ensured a par and Champ’s third PGA TOUR triumph.

A bogey-free, 5-under 66 on Sunday left Champ at 15-under 269, two shots clear of South Africans Louis Oosthuizen (66) and Charl Schwartzel (68) and Jhonnattan Vegas (68) of Venezuala. Keith Mitchell (67) finished alone in fifth.

“Obvoiusly,” Champ said, “I made it a little interesting.”

He did. The whole day, and entire tournament, was interesting. On an afternoon when the winds gusted to 20 mph and TPC Twin Cities stood its ground against a jam-packed leaderboard, Champ steadily took control with three birdies on his opening nine (he tied Vegas for the lead with a 10-footer at the par-3 eighth), and simply never allowed anyone to catch him.

Winning represents a great deal of ground covered in short time for Champ, who spent the spring and summer with a handful of weekends off after his poor play. His golf led him to reassess how he prioritizes it in his life. He was talking to himself on the way to shooting 77 in the second round of the Rocket Mortgage three weeks ago, and he didn’t like what he was seeing in the way he was acting. Off the golf course, Champ is relatively laid-back and stressfree. On it, he was becoming a monster. So he changed. Accepting that what he does for a vocation is only a small part of who he is, that’s something that freed up Champ to, well, become a champ again. And he did it in short order.

“You know, we're still young,” Champ said. “I just turned 26. Obviously, I've done a lot and I've had some success, but at the end of the day I still have to figure out myself and how I'm going to manage both of those sides.

“After Detroit (Rocket Mortgage) I just took a step back and said, ‘You know what? This is enough, I can't keep going on this way, I'm not enjoying the game, it's not fun, and in order for me to enjoy the game and for it to be fun, I have to be true to myself and who I truly am as a person.’ That's kind of how I've been on the course.”

At TPC Twin Cities all week, Champ didn’t get mad over poorly struck shots. Instead, he would look at, and assess, the process that led to them. For the week, he shot four rounds in the 60s; there weren’t too many bad shots.

On his glove each round, Champ scribbles the name of his newlywed, Jessica, and his late grandfather, Mack, who introduced him to the game, and he’ll look down to view the names often during his round. His wife, he said, is his everything. His grandfather was the man that Champ wants to be. Ask him about his potential these days, and the picture and goals are quite a bit larger than simply winning trophies.

“I'm married, now I have responsibilities, soon I want to start a family with my wife,” Champ said. “Again, for me, it's more so realizing what I want to do in the game of golf and then who I want to be at home. It's a balance you have to find, and if you don't, it can really haunt you. … I just feel like the last two months I've been in a lot better head space and kind of realizing what is truly important to me and what is not.”

Champ, whose tie for eighth at October's Zozo Championship was his lone top-10 in 22 previous starts this season, took the solo lead for good when he birdied the par-4 11th (after a 368-yard tee shot) and made a key birdie at the short par-4 16th to give himself a cushion going into TPC Twin Cities’ intimidating two finishing holes. At 16, before he rolled in a 14-footer, he crouched down, trying to gather himself. He felt shaky, dehydrated. And then he stepped up and delivered a birdie putt that stole all hope away from all his chasers.

Oosthuizen, on the heels of a close call at The Open Championship, was glad he ventured to 3M to play. The last thing he needed to do was sit on his farm for a week and brood about what could have been at Royal St. George’s, where Collin Morikawa clipped him for a Claret Jug. He made a nice push, getting to 12 under, and very nearly holed his lob wedge approach from 95 yards at the last, his ball spinning back and gently caroming off the flagstick. A tap-in birdie gave him the clubhouse lead at 13 under. Oosthuizen, the 2010 Open champion, still is seeking his first TOUR victory on U.S. soil. But he left Minneapolis pretty proud of his effort.

“Great track,” Oosthuizen said of TPC Twin Cities. “We had a good time here this week, and I'm just trying to see if I can go one better than all these seconds and thirds.

Vegas three-putted both par-3 holes on the back nine on Sunday, and the putter cost Schwartzel direly on the back nine as well. He was just off the front of the green at the friendly par-5 12th in two, but used putter three times and walked off with par. He then three-putted at the par-3 13th, missing for par from 3 feet. The good news: 3M marked Schwartzel’s third finish of T3 or better this season.

Champ moved from outside the top 125 all the way to No. 49 in the FedExCup standings. He only owns seven career top-10 finishes, but three times he walked away with a trophy. He is a closer.

“I feel like whenever I get in those moments, I'm super-comfortable and super ‘in the zone,’ and it feels like it's mine to take,” Champ said. “It's not so much mine to lose, I feel like it's mine to take. I feel that's how it was today.”

Amid a wild finish in Minneapolis, the day – again – belonged to Champ. This was great progress. He is a champion once more.