It took Chris Gotterup less than two full years as a pro to realize his touted potential of being a PGA Tour champion.
Gotterup, the consensus No. 1 collegiate golfer in 2022, took a four-shot lead into the final round of the inaugural $4 million Myrtle Beach Classic at The Dunes Golf and Beach Club and won in style, registering the largest win on the PGA Tour this season by six strokes at 22-under 262.
“I’m in the circle now,” Gotterup said. “. . . I definitely knew at some point hopefully that I would be in this position. But golf is a crazy game. You never know where you’re going to end up.”
Gotterup stumbled out of the gate in Sunday’s final round, making bogeys with three putts on each of the first two holes to see his lead cut to two shots – missing a 4-footer on the first and leaving a 60-footer 16 feet short on the second.
But the challenge to his lead was short-lived.
The 24-year-old Maryland native immediately rebounded by playing the next three holes 4-under par.
He hit a 160-yard approach out of a divot to 7 feet on the third hole, hit a 321-yard drive into the rough and 173-yard approach to 11 feet for an eagle on the par-5 fourth hole, and drained a 23-foot birdie putt on the 188-yard par-3 fifth hole to break away from his challengers.
He closed with a 4-under 67 Sunday and his lead was never challenged over his final 13 holes.
That allowed Gotterup to high-five fans along the fairway on his leisurely walk up to the 18th green to culminate his victory with an 11-foot birdie putt.
“What a great first event,” Gotterup said. “I’m sure it’s a big success for Visit Myrtle Beach. I’m honored to be the champion and it couldn’t have gone any better.”
Gotterup was able to celebrate with several members of his family after holing a final 11-foot birdie putt on the 18th green, including his mother Kate on Mother’s Day. He called his parents Saturday night, figuring they were going to fly to Myrtle Beach for the final round.
“I was like, ‘Just stay at home, like everything is going fine here.’ But she’s like, ‘All right, we’re coming,’ ” Gotterup said. “It was good because I ordered flowers and they weren’t going to make it today, so she’ll get them when she goes back home.”
He became the first player to win a PGA Tour event after bogeying the first two holes in the final round since Keith Mitchell in the 2019 Honda Classic.
“I wasn’t expecting it to just be smooth sailing,” Gotterup said. “The first hole was probably nerves. I don’t know, I really didn’t even feel that bad.”
Gotterup said he was more nervous before the round than once he got inside the ropes, in spite of the slow start.
“I set my alarm for 9, I got up at 6,” Gotterup said. “I was a little upset about that one, so I had some time to kill. I actually just went down to the beach and walked for an hour. . . . I probably looked like a lunatic this morning pacing up and down the beach, but it helps clear your mind.”
Though it’s an opposite field event being played concurrently with the more prestigious Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, the win still carries a lot of weight on tour.
Gotterup receives $720,000, a two-year PGA Tour exemption through 2026, 300 FedExCup points, and exemptions into next week’s PGA Championship and the 2025 season-opening The Sentry and Players Championship events. He’s also in a strong position to get into the final two $20 million Signature Events of the year.
“I think the biggest thing is the two more years. I’ve got no stress in my life for two years other than golf stress,” Gotterup said. “Now I can just go focus on trying to make a move further up the FedExCup [points list].”
Myrtle Beach was Gotterup’s 27th PGA Tour start.
His top finishes prior to Sunday were a tie for seventh in his PGA Tour debut as an amateur at the 2022 Puerto Rico Open and tie for fourth at the 2022 John Deere Classic. A tie for 11th with partner Austin Eckroat two weeks ago in the Zurich Classic of New Orleans team event was his best finish in 12 previous starts this year.
“I’ve always kind of just gone about my business, waiting for my opportunity,” Gotterup said. “I figured if I could just keep working hard and doing what I’m supposed to be doing, at some point you would think it’s going to go your way. That’s why golf is crazy. You’ve got guys who are probably plenty deserving to have won and have never won. I’m happy to be on the other side of that.”
Gotterup won the Haskins and Jack Nicklaus awards in 2022 while at Oklahoma, recognizing him as the top college golfer that year.
He enjoyed the benefits of his stellar amateur resume with seven sponsor exemptions in eight PGA Tour starts – not including his tie for 43rd in the U.S. Open – in 2022, but in the end he went the traditional route to the PGA Tour with a finish of 23rd on the 2023 Korn Ferry Tour money list following a full season on the feeder circuit.
“I feel like I’ve done a lot of the right things in my process and going through the system that the tour has provided, and yeah, now we’re here,” Gotterup said.
The four-shot lead entering the final round matched the largest 54-hole lead on tour this year held by both Jake Knapp at the Mexico Open at Vidanta and Akshay Bhatia at the Valero Texas Open, who also both went on to win.
Gotterup’s 36- and 54-hole leads at The Dunes Club were his first after any round on the PGA Tour.
“I feel like I belong at a high level. Not that I didn’t before, but now I have some more accolades to prove it,” Gotterup said. “Obviously this is a big notch on the belt, but I feel like I have a lot of room to improve as well, which is the fun part about it. Obviously I played great this week and grinded it out, but me and [caddie] A.J. out there, we were talking about things that we can get better at while we’re playing, which is the fun part.”
Gotterup began growing a mustache as a team-bonding exercise with Eckroat for the Zurich Classic, and Sunday’s win brings the shaving of the facial hair into question.
“I don’t want to [keep it], but I don’t think I can shave it now,” Gotterup said. “I assume my mom is probably going to tell me to take it off. But we’ll see. It’s going to stay for now.”
Other exceptional performances
Though Gotterup gave the master performance, he wasn’t alone in recording noteworthy highlights in the PGA Tour’s first visit to the Grand Strand.
Alistair Docherty, a sponsor exemption into the field who is sponsored by Barstool Sports, and Davis Thompson, who was a college star at Georgia, tied for second at 16-under 268.
A veteran of 39 Korn Ferry Tour events, including seven this season, Docherty, 30, was playing in just his second PGA Tour event. Top-10 finishes on the PGA Tour automatically qualify players for the next regular field event, so the Canadian native is exempt into the RBC Canadian Open from May 30-June 2.
“I was crying with my mom. Happy Mother’s Day to her. I couldn’t be happier. I couldn’t be happier,” an emotional Docherty said shortly after his final round. “I needed to put myself in contention and make sure that I could finish in the top 10 in order to keep going, and what better way to go back to Canada.”
Docherty, who opened the tournament with a 65, shot a 7-under 64 in Sunday’s final round with four birdies on both the front nine and back nine and moved up 17 spots on the leaderboard.
He has missed four of seven cuts on the Korn Ferry this year with a top finish of 20th, but the finish Sunday proved to Docherty “that I can be here. I can be here, and I can play with the best of them. I can do it.”
Docherty had all but given up on a pro career, took a break from playing and was caddying in Scottsdale, Arizona, when he met Briggs from Barstool.
“I ran into Riggs at the right time, played my ass off in front of him, and I impressed him enough that he’s been helping me ever since,” Docherty said. “. . . It’s been amazing. It’s really the only reason why I’m still playing. If I didn’t run into Riggs at the right time, I don’t know if I’d still be playing or standing right here. It’s an amazing partnership, and hopefully it keeps going, and we’ll bring something big in the future.”
Earlier Sunday, Thorbjorn Olesen of Denmark set The Dunes Club’s course record with a 10-under 61.
Amateur Blades Brown, 16, of Nashville shot a 2-under 69 Sunday to tie for 26th at 10-under 274. He’s the second 16-year-old in two weeks to make a cut on the PGA Tour, joining England’s Kris Kim, who became the youngest player to make a cut on tour in nine years at the CJ Cup Byron Nelson.
“This is the most fun I’ve ever had at a golf tournament, from the fans, from my play to my family being here,” Brown said. “All in all, it’s been one heck of a day, one heck of a weekend. I’ve never had that many people following my group before. The closest thing was the U.S. Amateur, and even this makes that look like really small.
“But just the support that [tournament operator] SportFive has given me on the sponsor exemption, and the course, Myrtle Beach Classic, this is a week I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”
Brown said he learned that his game can hold up with some of the best players in the world despite his youth, and he received support and advice from numerous tour members throughout the week, particularly Ben Griffin, 28.
“Everybody here that I’ve talked to, they’ve kind of taken me under their wing. . . . I can’t tell if that’s because I’m not getting any money this week,” he joked. “No, but it’s been awesome.”
It’s back to being a high school sophomore on Monday. “Next week I have like five exams I need to take, so I’m going to have to hard-core study these next few days,” he said. “It’s definitely going to feel a little different.”
