The sun set, literally and figuratively, on the 2020 PGA Tour Champions season Sunday night, darkness ultimately prevailing and requiring two players to return on Monday morning to apply its epitaph.
Kevin Sutherland and Paul Broadhurst, tied after 54 holes of the Charles Schwab Cup Championship in Phoenix, each parred six extra holes at Phoenix Country Club, the last of them in the dark. They’ll resume at 10 a.m. (EST) on Monday morning.
“That’s 2020,” one of the players said, a nice summary of a difficult year for all. Or, as Sutherland said afterwards, “it was crazy.”
Sutherland came into the final round with a five-stroke lead and six over Broadhurst, who erased his deficit with an eight-under-par 63.
Then the craziness began. They played the par-4 17th and par-5 18th three times in the playoff. Sutherland had several opportunities to mercifully end it, notably on the fifth extra hole when a short birdie putt seemingly with perfect pace nonetheless lipped out.
“We played them really fast, by the way,” Sutherland said. “Just seemed like we couldn’t make a putt. We had some opportunities for birdie, but neither one of us could find a way to make one.”
Added Broadhurst, “As quick as I’ve ever played six holes.”
Sutherland, who won this event as well as the season-long Charles Schwab Cup competition in 2017, shot a final-round two-under-par 69. The two of them finished at 15-under-par 198, three clear of the rest of the field.
No Charles Schwab Cup champion will be crowned this year; the pandemic reduced the senior schedule to only 15 events, so the 2020 and 2021 seasons have been combined.