KAPALUA, Hawaii – After birdieing half the holes at Kapalua Resort’s Plantation Course on Saturday along with an eagle for an 11-under 62, Hideki Matsuyama never cracked a smile. The 32-year-old Japanese star also declined to speak separately to the Japanese media, a dedicated crew that follows his every shot and hangs on his every word, for the second straight day. And this was – we repeat – after a bogey-free 62 that set a tournament 54-hole scoring mark and equaled the Tour record too.
“I mean, he was matching me (Saturday) shot for shot, and I felt like I was playing lights out, right?” said Collin Morikawa, who had matched Matsuyama shot for shot and didn’t bother to hit another ball at the range. “Like, yes, you could leave some shots out there, but you shoot 11-under on any golf course, you’re going to be happy, right?”
Matsuyama, however, is his own toughest critic and he high-tailed it to the range to iron out the flaws he perceived in his game. What could he possibly need to do at the range is a head scratcher, but Matsuyama said he needed to fix his driver and we’ll take his word because it worked. The grind never ends, and very few can match Matsuyama’s grit and determination to scrape every ounce of brilliance out of his game.
All the hard work paid off on Sunday when Matsuyama took dead aim at the par-4 fourth hole and two-hopped a wedge from 107 yards into the hole for an eagle.
The mercurial Matsuyama, who has a well-earned reputation for hanging his head or dropping a hand off his club in disgust, only for the shot in question to be a thing of beauty, stared down his approach at the fourth and knocked knuckles with his caddie when it dropped. He closed in 8-under 65 to win The Sentry, the season-opening tournament on the PGA Tour by three shots over Morikawa, and notch his third victory in a signature event in the last 10 months.
Morikawa, who shot a final-round 67 despite his putter cooling off, reached the par-5 15th in two and made birdie to trim his deficit to two but once Matsuyama wedged inside 4 feet at 16 to stretch the lead to three, Morikawa sensed that he wasn’t going to catch Matsuyama. He settled for his second runner-up at The Sentry in the last three years.
“Excuse my language, but 35-under par is, that’s low,” said Morikawa, dropping an F-bomb for emphasis. “Today he just never let up.”