Collin Morikawa found the perfect ending to his 2023 PGA Tour season.
With a nearly flawless final-round 63, Morikawa cruised to a six-stroke victory over Eric Cole and Beau Hossler to capture the Zozo Championship near Tokyo.
It ended a two-year winless period for Morikawa, whose last victory came at the 2021 Open Championship at Royal St. George’s and included two near-misses earlier this year.
“It feels incredible,†Morikawa said Sunday after his bogey-free 7-under final round at Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club in Chiba, Japan, capped a 14-under 266 total. “Every win's so different, and every experience, whether it's winning or losing, you learn a lot, but this one just meant the world.
“Obviously having this kind of two-year drought, just struggling at times, not really contending, to do what I did through this entire week, Thursday, Friday, and then how I started my round yesterday with a double bogey, it just – that's the golf I miss playing.â€
After opening with a 64 to take the first-round lead, Morikawa found himself in a crowded pack near the top of the leaderboard through the weekend. While Cole and Hossler were chasing their first tour wins, Morikawa looked like the world-beater who won two majors in a 12-month span in 2020-21 again.
For Morikawa, 26, a native Californian whose great-grandparents lived in Japan before moving to Hawaii, the Zozo Championship has found a place on his short list of must-play events each season.
It was his last official PGA Tour start this year and put a nice bow on a year that began with Morikawa losing a six-stroke lead entering the final round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions in January. He also lost a playoff to Rickie Fowler in the Rocket Mortgage Championship during the summer.
Always one of the game’s most consistent ball-strikers, Morikawa has found that his putting rarely has been as reliable as his long game. In 2021-22, Morikawa ranked 178th on tour in strokes gained putting, 131st last year and is 111th this year.
At the Zozo, Morikawa installed a change that made a difference.
“We found something, and we're going to stick to it,†said Morikawa, who earned $1.53 million from the $8.5 million purse for his sixth career victory. “Look, you never know whether it's going to be right or wrong, but something was off. Something I just couldn't figure out.
“[Caddie] J.J. [Jakovac] and I were just looking at each other very confused and trying a bunch of different things. We weren't changing too much. We were just trying to look at putts a different way. We stuck to it. It was nice to see putts roll in in the first round, and then that continued.â€
The Japan stop, the PGA Tour’s lone visit to Asia this season, represents the first of three tournaments outside of the U.S. After a week off, the tour will visit the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula on November 2-5 for the World Wide Technology Championship at El Cardonal at Diamante, a Tiger Woods design, in Cabo San Lucas. The Butterfield Bermuda Championship will follow on November 9-12 before the tour returns to the U.S. for the last of its seven fall events, the RSM Classic at Sea Island Resort on St. Simons Island, Georgia.
Ron Green Jr.
