{"id":579829,"date":"2026-02-10T12:27:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T12:27:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/579829\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T12:27:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T12:27:14","slug":"red-hot-rutgers-alums-rapid-rise-continues-with-epic-comeback-to-win-another-pga-tour-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/579829\/","title":{"rendered":"Red-hot Rutgers alum\u2019s rapid rise continues with epic comeback to win another PGA Tour event"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chris Gotterup\u2019s<\/a> rapid rise in the golfing world continued with an epic comeback on Super Bowl Sunday.<\/a><\/p>\n

Entering the final day of the Phoenix Open trailing leader Hideki Matsuyama by four strokes, the Rutgers<\/a> alum stormed back to force a playoff hole, where he won the competition with a long birdie putt minutes before the NFL\u2019s championship game kicked off in Santa Clara.<\/p>\n

The Phoenix Open title marks Gotterup\u2019s second win in three tournaments in 2026, a red-hot start to the year<\/a> that has boosted his stock in multiple ways. He is now ranked fifth in the world in the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR)<\/a>, a 23-spot jump from the start of the year and a 201-spot jump from where he stood after last year\u2019s Phoenix Open.<\/p>\n

The victory earned Gotterup a prize of $1,728,000, bringing his career earnings into the eight-figure range: $10,099,780. The fourth PGA Tour win of his career, only World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler (14) and Rory McIlroy (5) have won more events in the past three years than him.<\/p>\n

SUBSCRIBE TO THE RUTGERS RANT ON YOUTUBE: <\/b>Watch our weekly podcast, live postgame reactions and more<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Gotterup\u2019s big weekend finished as well as it started. He led the field at TPC Scottsdale by two strokes following the first day, where he shot an 8-under 63 without a single bogey while getting paired with Scheffler and former world No. 1 Jordan Spieth.<\/p>\n

Gotterup slipped down the leaderboard with back-to-back uneven days, shooting a combined 1-under-par across the second and third rounds. He entered the final day at 9-under, sitting four strokes behind a steady Matsuyama, who put together three straight days of strong golf.<\/p>\n

Gotterup needed a big finish and a bit of luck to overcome the deficit, and he got both.<\/p>\n

He finished with five birdies on his final six holes, putting pressure on Matsuyama. The leader cracked under pressure, missing a go-ahead putt on 18 to allow the tournament to go into a playoff. In the extra hole, Gotterup notched a 27-foot birdie to seal the victory after Matsuyama yanked his shot into the water.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou never know what to expect,\u201d Gotterup said, per the Associated Press. \u201cWe went over to the first tee, hit a couple balls, was watching, and then all of a sudden you\u2019re out there on 18 and everyone is going nuts and you\u2019re like, all right, this is it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chris Gotterup\u2019s rapid rise in the golfing world continued with an epic comeback on Super Bowl Sunday. Entering…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":579830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[47],"tags":[1430,1456,251613,245714,62,251614,67,132,68,249242],"class_list":["post-579829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-pga-tour","tag-pga-tour-golf","tag-phoenix-open","tag-sports","tag-tpc-scottsdale-stadium-course","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-waste-management-phoenix-open"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116046334738432561","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}