The stats will tell you no one has ever shot a lower final round in a men’s major. 63 blows and now Tommy Fleetwood has done it twice. It’s a record, but probably not the one he wanted.
For if you believe in déjà vu, the Englishman suffered a massive dose. Five years ago on the last day at Shinnecock Hills, as he chased down Brooks Koepka, Fleetwood had a putt for a 62 – a chance to break the scoring record at America’s national championship.
The putt dribbled agonisingly past the hole and, after scorching round Los Angeles Country Club with a similar late flourish to this US Open, history repeated itself.
Three days after Rickie Fowler and Xander Schauffele both wrote themselves into the US Open books, and matched Branden Grace’s historic 62 at Royal Birkdale at the 2017 Open, Fleetwood had the opportunity to join them – but once more just missed out.
Hitting his approach at the last to five feet, after drilling in an incredible par putt at 17, Fleetwood pushed his record-tying effort wide.
One missed putt shouldn’t dampen the ardour on what was an incredible round of golf in the City of Angels. And if there was anguish, it did not appear to last long.
“After coming off disappointed it’s pretty cool to be the first human ever to shoot two 63s on a Sunday at a US Open!!!” he tweeted.
“It’s a nice little piece of history, of course, it is,” he added in his press conference. “And you can be disappointed with what I didn’t get out of today, but I think having something like that and shooting multiple 63s in a major, and I think anything like days like today where you can put in the memory bank and know that you can get rounds going and your game can stand up on a major golf course and shoot low scores is really nice to have.”
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Perhaps the only surprise was that the scoring rush took the whole week to arrive.
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Cruelly denied his first PGA Tour win by Nick Taylor’s 72-foot miracle on the fourth playoff hole at the Canadian Open a week ago, Fleetwood arrived at the third major of the year as one of the fancied contenders only to shoot 73, 69, and 70 over the first three days.
Solid stuff, but not the kind of form that put him in contention.
Perhaps with nothing to lose on the North Course, the Southport native exploded into life. A birdie on the 2nd, an eagle on the 6th, more birdies on 8 and 9 as he reached the turn in 30 shots.
He birdied the 11th before hitting a sensational 5-wood on 14 and then outrageously finding the bottom of the hole from distance for a second eagle of the day.
Hitting out of the fairway bunker on 16, he left his par putt fractionally short and so needed to find one more shot on two of LACC’s most challenging holes.
But he hammered in a par at 17 before setting up the chance to join golfing royalty with a wonderful approach at the last.
The putt stayed out and, despite another incredible late show at a major, Fleetwood might be thinking of what might have been.
What did you make of that incredible final US Open round for Tommy Fleetwood? Let us know with a tweet.
