Cameron Champ wins Sanderson Farms Championship

JACKSON, Miss. – Holding a Sunday lead on the PGA TOUR is hard enough, especially for a rookie. It’s even more difficult when the strongest club in your bag breaks minutes before your tee time.

Cameron Champ was warming up for the final round of the Sanderson Farms Championship when he noticed a squirrely ball flight on one of his tee shots. After one more shot, the club’s crown cracked open.

An old driver got the promotion from the trunk to the staff bag. A slightly different swingweight required compensations to keep the club in the fairway.

“I just tried to hit as many balls as I could on the range, just to get used to it a little bit,” he said. Champ, 23, overcame the obstacle to win the Sanderson Farms Championship by four shots, shooting a 68 in the final round to finish four shots ahead of Corey Conners.

Champ already has a reputation for drives that are longer than a Ken Burns documentary. His prodigious length landed him on the cover of Golf Digest before his second PGA TOUR start.

His win Sunday at the Sanderson Farms Championship proved that he’s more than a sideshow. After losing a four-shot lead on the front nine Sunday, he sank several crucial putts to hold off Conners on the closing holes.

Champ’s driver was important this week – he led the field in driving distance, averaging an incredible 334 yards on the two measured holes at the Country Club of Jackson -- but the shortest club in his bag also played a starring role. He finished second in Strokes Gained: Putting.

He looked discouraged on the front nine, letting go of the club with one hand on the follow-through of several tee shots. He took solace in the fact that he’d dominated the Country Club of Jackson’s inward nine all week, making 16 birdies and no bogeys.

He let an easy birdie opportunity pass when he failed to get up-and-down from in front of the green on the par-5 11th, though. Two holes later, Champ was staring at a 10-foot birdie putt. He knew that if he missed, Conners could take the lead for the first time Sunday.

Champ pumped his fist after making his putt. It was the strongest emotion he’d shown thus far in the final round, but it was just a taste of what was to come. Conners then sank his own birdie putt to stay tied with five holes remaining.

“I just felt like it was big,” Champ said, calling it his first realistic birdie opportunity since the sixth hole. “It gave me a little momentum going into the par-5, as well.”

Once again, Champ was just short of the green on a par-5. He opted for the putter this time and it paid off with a birdie. After Conners failed to get up-and-down from a greenside bunker, Champ sank his 7-foot birdie putt to take a one-shot lead. They matched birdies on the next hole, a drivable par-4, after Conners’ eagle putt slid by the hole. Champ got up-and-down from short and right of the green, pitching over a greenside bunker to a green that ran away from him.

Conners called their halve the turning point.

“I knew if I made that one it would give me a lot of momentum going into the last three holes,” Conners said.

On the next hole, Champ was the one who holed a crucial putt.

His approach shot to the 479-yard, par-4 16th, the course’s hardest hole, was 30 yards shorter than Conners’. It was Conners who had the shorter birdie putt, though.

Champ pumped his fist when his 38-foot putt curled into the hole. It gave him a two-shot lead with two holes remaining.

“That wasn’t a putt I was trying to make,” he admitted. “I was just trying to just have good speed and get it down there for an easy par. Obviously, it had perfect speed and read it perfectly and just dropped in there.”

Champ holed a 12-foot par putt at the next hole to maintain his two-stroke lead. He closed the tournament with a 7-foot birdie putt after an impressive recovery from the left trees.

He holed all five putts that he faced Sunday from 5-10 feet. He holed nine putts from outside 10 feet this week. He gained more than nine strokes on the greens this week, including seven in the final two rounds. He saved his best for last, gaining 4.02 strokes on the greens in the final two rounds.

“That’s definitely been a part of my game I’ve worked extremely hard on,” Champ said. “I’m just trying to slowly [develop] other parts of my game … because my ball-striking has been so good.”

Champ is more than a long driver. He proved that Sunday at the Sanderson Farms Championship.