At age 37 and having played the PGA Tour with varying levels of success since 2007, Luke List naturally wondered if that elusive first victory would ever happen.
It finally came Saturday at the Farmers Insurance Open where List shot a final-round 66 at Torrey Pines’ South Course then waited two hours while others fired and fell back, leaving List to win a sudden-death playoff over Will Zalatoris with a birdie on the first extra hole.
“You wonder if it's going to be your turn, but I truly believe I found something this last six, eight months of golf,” said List, who won in his 207th career tour start.
“I've worked so hard with my coach, Jamie Mulligan, and I've done all the right things. I've got an amazing team around me and I think that’s what the best players do, they have this great network and everyone pushes each other and they hold each other accountable.”
The victory earned List a spot in the Masters, a tournament he hasn’t played since 2005 when he competed as an amateur after a runner-up finish to Ryan Moore in the 2004 U.S. Amateur.
“Living in Augusta now the last four years, driving past there, I can't tell you how much this means to me. That is a special place and I might get emotional,” List said.
“That's why you work hard, that's why you do these things every day, that's why you travel away from your family at times. To tee it up in April in Augusta will be a lot of hard work, but just really special to have my family. And sleeping in my own bed will be really cool. I'm just over the moon about that.”
One other benefit from List’s victory on Sunday – he delivered on his daughter Ryann’s question to win a trophy.
“I don't know when it first started, but I would leave for the morning whenever I was at a tournament and she'd say, ‘Go win a trophy,’ and then when I was home or she was home watching on TV or whatever, my wife would say, ‘Oh, Daddy's going to try to win a trophy,’ ” List said.
“Then my wife will follow on the app, and then it snowballed into, ‘Oh, Daddy made a bogey,’ or ‘Daddy made a birdie.’ Just kids’ humor, their minds are so funny. I think she saw a trophy at RSM at Sea Island. They drove down and saw the trophy and thought there was candy in it, so it just became a funny joke that we used to say I'd go win a trophy.”
There was no candy in the Farmers trophy but for List and his family, it was plenty sweet.
Ron Green Jr.