Top-ranked Dustin Johnson didn’t have his best stuff, but was good enough to be holding the FedEx Cup for the first time at the end of the day.
DJ’s five-stroke lead at the start of the final round was down to two at times, but he shot 2-under-par 68 to win the Tour Championship by three shots over third-ranked Justin Thomas and 11th-ranked Xander Schauffele at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta.
“I’m very pleased to be the FedEx Cup champion,” said Johnson, who claimed the 23rd victory of his career and third this season. “It’s a very tough trophy to win and I’ve been close a few times, so it was nice to get it done today.
“There were so many good players right behind me and they played well, so it got close toward the end. I started out well, but missed some putts early on the back nine and didn’t hit the fairway a few times, which you have to do here.
“This is a tough golf course so no lead is safe, but I wanted to be a FedEx Cup champion at some point in my career and played well enough to win it.”
Johnson, who won The Northern Trust to Open the PGA Tour playoffs and lost in a playoff to Jon Rahm of Spain last week in the BMW Championship, birdied three of the first six holes before making his only two bogeys, but didn’t make another birdie until a five-foot putt on the last hole put the icing on a 21-under finish.
Thomas, the 2017 FedEx Cup champion, made two birdies on the last three holes but had a costly bogey at No. 17 in a 66, while Schauffele, the 2017 Tour Championship winner from La Jolla and San Diego State, collected five birdies against a single bogey in his own 66.
“Hats off to Dustin,” said Thomas, who has finished in the top 10 in all five of his appearances in the Tour Championship without winning the tournament.
Said Schauffele: “DJ deserved to win the FedEx Cup. He won the first event of the playoffs, tied for second last week and won this one.”
The second-ranked Rahm sank a 15-foot eagle putt on the sixth hole and a 10-footer for birdie on the last hole for his own 66 to finish four back in fourth, while rookie Scottie Scheffler posted a bogey-free 65 and was seven down in fifth.
Colin Morikawa, the PGA champion from La Canada Flintridge and Cal, was one more behind in sixth after a 69, while Tyrrell Hatton of England birdied the last two holes for a 66 and finished nine back in seventh.
Fourth-ranked Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland, the defending Tour Championship and FedEx Cup winner, closed with a 67 to wind up 10 behind in a tie for eighth with ninth-ranked Patrick Reed, who had a bogey-free 65, and Sebastian Munoz of Colombia, who came it at 66.
Sixth-ranked Webb Simpson made a double-bogey 6 on the 17th hole and fell out of the top 10 with a tie for 12th following a 68, eighth-ranked Bryson DeChambeau of Clovis was 22nd after a double-bogey 7 on the last hole left him at 71, while 2014 FedEx Cup and Tour Championship winner Billy Horschel was 30th and dead last following a 70.
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