By the time it finally ended Sunday, 23-year-old Mao Saigo may have been as surprised as she was excited to have suddenly won the Chevron Championship.
Just getting into the five-way playoff had been a grind for Saigo, who shot a shaky 74 in the final round at the Club at Carlton Woods, but after watching the other four players fire blanks with their own chances on the first extra hole, the Japanese player turned herself into a major champion by doing what the biggest events so often ask.
Be the last player standing.
“This is like dreaming,” Saigo said through an interpreter after a turbulent final hour when both Ariya Jutanugarn and Ruoning Yin seemed destined to win.
Had Jutanugarn not nearly whiffed a chip shot from behind the green on the 72nd hole, moving her ball just 2 inches, she might have won in regulation, but her nervous mistake ultimately invited Saigo, Yin, Hyo Joo Kim and Lindy Duncan to go extra holes with the season’s first major championship on the line.
Like most majors, this one pulled a collection of strings together at the end, all set up on a difficult golf course on which none of the top eight players at the end managed to break 70 on Sunday.
Particularly in a major, the stories reach beyond the shots that are played and center on the players.
It was a breakthrough victory for Saigo, who’s in her second year on the LPGA Tour.
It was a stinging missed opportunity for Jutanugarn, who has two major wins but won’t soon forget what slipped away Sunday. Yin three-putted the first extra hole when her 15-foot eagle putt would have won the tournament, and Kim couldn’t make a putt when she needed one.
At age 34 with more than a decade of professional golf behind her, Duncan had never been in a place like she found herself Sunday – the final pairing in the final round of a major.
Then there was Duncan, whose most impressive career achievement may be her dogged determination to keep going in a game that hasn’t often loved her back.
“I’m living the dream,” she said Saturday evening, sitting one shot off the lead.
Three years ago, Duncan seriously considered giving it all up. She had been a four-time All-American at Duke when the game came easier to her more than a decade ago, but playing golf for a living has been hard work for her. In her previous 176 professional starts on the LPGA Tour, Duncan had managed just nine top-10 finishes.
“It’s been a long journey. It’s been a fun ride. Just continuing to try to get better, but for sure there is up and downs to it. The downs feel really down, but you just got to keep fighting your way through it,” Duncan said.
After losing her LPGA status, Duncan played the Epson Tour in 2022, the women’s version of the Korn Ferry Tour. It’s a place for players closer to their 20th birthday than just past their 30th and its rewards are more personal than financial. Want to find out how badly you want to be a professional golfer? The Epson Tour will tell you.
“The year that I spent playing Epson, I pretty much decided this is not what I want to do,” Duncan said. “This didn’t feel like my game. I just didn’t feel like myself.
“There were definitely many moments where I was thinking of a future without playing. But what kept me in it was I still just love it. I still love the tournaments, and I still feel like my game was in there.”
Four days at the Chevron Championship validated Duncan’s self-belief, a precious commodity in a game that can be as heartless as it can be heartwarming.
The disappointment of having come so close was offset to a degree by how she had handled herself on the biggest stage of her career.
“In the past I’ve hit the panic button really quick, and I really messed up a whole bunch of times in four rounds and still made it to a playoff in a major championship,” Duncan said.
Perspective matters.
While Duncan was coming to grips with the biggest week of her pro career, world No. 1 Nelly Korda left Carlton Woods still chasing what she had a year ago.
The similarities she shares with Scottie Scheffler this year go beyond their hosting exclusive champions dinners at the year’s first majors. Scheffler won nine times last year and Korda won seven times, including five in a row culminating with the 2024 Chevron Championship.
Both are still chasing their first victories this year, judged by the almost impossibly high standards they set last year.
Grinding to make the cut after shooting 77 in the first round, Korda was on the outside looking in with nine holes to play Friday but wound up shooting 68, a glimmer of the form she flashed last year.
“It’s been a grind of a week,” Korda said Sunday. “Walking onto eight tee on Friday I was 7-over par so I’m proud of my fight.
“Obviously I have a lot to work on. Last year was last year. Such an amazing year but that’s in the past. It’s not going to help me with my future.”
The future may still belong to Korda, but on a twisting, turning Sunday afternoon outside Houston, the moment belonged to Mao Saigo.
E-MAIL RON
Top: Mao Saigo totes the spoils of her Chevron victory.
ALEX SLITZ, GETTY IMAGES