Family counts for so much in South Louisiana.<\/p>\n
In South Yorkshire in England, as well.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s where brothers Matt and Alex Fitzpatrick are from. Two Yorkshire lads who used to stand on the practice green at Hallamshire Golf Club near their hometown of Sheffield and tell each other, \u201cThis is to win a PGA Tour event. This is to win a major.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the time finally came for Alex Fitzpatrick to make such a putt Sunday, after Matt blasted his 35-yard bunker shot on the 18th hole at TPC Louisiana to 14 inches left of the cup, he couldn\u2019t feel his hands. Couldn\u2019t feel his legs. But after big brother Matt put a reassuring arm around him, Alex knocked in the birdie putt that allowed them to win the Zurich Classic of New Orleans by one nerve-jangling stroke over Alex Smalley\/Hayden Springer and Kristoffer Reitan\/Kris Ventura.<\/p>\n
\u201cI never thought it would happen,\u201d Alex Fitzpatrick said.<\/p>\n
It did, a moment that capped off the most emotionally satisfying Zurich Classic ever.<\/p>\n
When Phil Mickelson tearfully won the 2010 Masters after his wife and mother battled cancer, CBS announcer Jim Nantz intoned that it was \u201cA win for the family.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nantz, who spent part of his childhood in Metairie, wasn\u2019t here for this weekend\u2019s CBS telecast. But a win for the Fitzpatrick family \u2014 their parents were here to see it in person \u2014 is indeed what it was.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo win a team event on the PGA Tour with my brother, I don\u2019t think it gets better than that. For me personally, it\u2019s just under winning a major,\u201d said Matt Fitzpatrick, who won the 2022 U.S. Open.<\/p>\n
The victory made Alex an exempt member of the PGA Tour through the 2028 season. For Matt, his third win in his past five starts, moved him to No. 1 on the PGA Tour\u2019s FedEx Cup points list ahead of Scottie Scheffler, who Fitzpatrick beat in a playoff a week earlier to win the RBC Heritage.<\/p>\n
It was a much different atmosphere in Avondale for the Fitzpatrick krewe than it was for Matt on Hilton Head Island. There, he endured chants of \u201cUSA! USA!\u201d as he wrestled the trophy away from the popular and personable Scheffler.<\/p>\n
Here, the Fitzpatricks were the fan favorites as well as the pre-tournament betting favorites (more than a coincidence?). You got a sense the partying patrons knew what winning would mean for the brothers. And what it would mean for the Zurich Classic itself.<\/p>\n
The Zurich may be in a great city at a great time (the first weekend of Jazz Fest) and the PGA Tour\u2019s only team event. But it is also a garden-variety PGA Tour stop. Presently, the Zurich is sandwiched on the schedule between the Masters two weeks ago, three so-called \u201cSignature events\u201d \u2014 with $20 million purses compared to the Zurich\u2019s $9.5 million \u2014 and then the next major in line, the PGA Championship.<\/p>\n
Many of the tour\u2019s biggest stars saw this as a week for a much-needed break. That included Scheffler and two-time Masters champ Rory McIlroy, who won here in 2024 with Shane Lowry (he teamed with five-time major winner Brooks Koepka, but they missed the cut). Then there\u2019s the uncertainty of where tournaments like the Zurich will fit into the PGA Tour\u2019s scheduling plans starting with the 2028 season, when the tour could institute two tiers of events.<\/p>\n
Organizers touted the \u201cwatch the future stars come out\u201d angle of this year\u2019s tournament, but in reality, what was best for the Zurich was for an established star to share the top prize. That\u2019s what it got in Matt Fitzpatrick, ranked No. 3 in the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is the best player in the world,\u201d Alex said. \u201cThat\u2019s my opinion.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Fitzpatricks started the day with a sizable four-stroke lead, but on the back nine it looked like they would be fried like a Sheffield fishcake (I don\u2019t know, it\u2019s something they eat there). Matt\u2019s wayward drive on the par-4 12th hole led to a double-bogey, and they followed that with a bogey on the par-3 14th, their lead over Smalley\/Springer and Reitan\/Ventura vanishing.<\/p>\n
But Sheffield is a tough place filled with tough people, a city that helped forge the industrial revolution. Stainless steel, which golf clubs are made of, was invented there, a century before Alex caddied for Matt when he won the 2013 U.S. Amateur at The Country Club outside Boston, Massachusetts. It\u2019s the same place Matt would win the 2022 U.S. Open.<\/p>\n
The brothers made clutch up and downs for par saves on 13 and 15, setting up their winning shots on the par-5 18th.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d say it\u2019s as good a bunker shot as I\u2019ve ever hit,\u201d Matt said, \u201cbut that may be lying. But to hit it the way I did and to finish where it did, to make it the most stress-free tap-in of all time (for Alex) for such a big occasion was really, really nice.\u201d<\/p>\n
By the way, Matt\u2019s wife, Katherine, is expecting their first child this fall.<\/p>\n
By the time Matt and Alex return to defend their title next April, the family will have grown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Family counts for so much in South Louisiana. In South Yorkshire in England, as well. That\u2019s where brothers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56222,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[21980,51],"class_list":{"0":"post-56221","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-zurich","8":"tag-hardwall","9":"tag-zurich"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116474885102046499","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56221\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}