Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship Recap: Swafford Swoops In

Even on an NFL Sunday, even on the mad-scramble final day of baseball's regular season, even in the weakest field on the PGA Tour in years, there can be drama in a little ol' golf tournament.

Hudson Swafford, trying to make it back from some lean years, overcame a hornet sting on Friday -- but more importantly, incredible nerves on the back nine Sunday -- to win his second career PGA Tour event. Officially, the tournament is the Corales Puntacana Resort and Club Championship but to the 33-year-old Swafford it could simply be called his career's "second chance."

Since winning the old Bob Hope tournament in 2017, Swafford had registered only nine top-25s in his ensuing 75 events, undergone foot surgery in July 2019 and saw his world ranking plummet into the 400s.

"The last two years have been tough," Swafford said on NBC right after he won.

So you could see how a hornet sting would barely register. He got stung after the first hole Friday but still managed to emerge with the 36-hole lead. A bigger impediment arose late on Sunday.

Swafford was cruising along with a four-stroke lead until a double-bogey on 13 and then a bogey on 15 cost him sole possession of the lead. But he never lost at least a share, and after making a clutch birdie on the par-3 17th, he had it back outright. All he needed was a par on 18. Following a perfect drive left him in the middle of the fairway 153 yards away, he seemed to have settled down. But a way-short wedge left him a long putt on the two-tiered green. Worse, the ensuing putt left him about eight feet short with no margin for error.

But he rolled it right in, completing both a 65-67-69-69 week at the par-72 Corales course in the Dominican Republic as well as his long road back. Swafford had just exchanged his soon-to-expire major medical extension for a two-year Tour exemption, which, coming so early in the season, is in effect a three-year exemption.

The win moved Swafford from 345th in the world rankings to 165th, quite a leap in such a weak field. The strength of field as determined by the OWGR website was 62, the lowest in a full-points event since the Tour went to a wraparound schedule in 2013-14.

That means little to Swafford, of course, or to the TV watchers who switched away from football and baseball to watch a great golf finish.

MONDAY BACKSPIN

Tyler McCumber
The son of 10-time PGA Tour winner Mark McCumber entered ranked 535th in the world and exited at 303rd after a solo runner-up. In his 10 previous starts, he missed eight cuts with one WD and a tie for 29th at the opposite-field Barracuda. This was only his 24th PGA Tour event and his first top-10. It could be a while before his next.

Mackenzie Hughes
A runner-up last year to Puntacana winner Graeme McDowell, Hughes caught Swafford on the back nine only to commit a fatal bogey on 18. That dropped him to solo third. But he also moved to a career-best 48th in the world rankings; he was around 300th back in February. Even though this was not strong field, we've seen enough of Hughes over the past few months to know that his ranking is deserved.

Adam Long
At the BMW Championship, it was an agonizing finish to a terrific 2019-20 season for Long, who finished 31st in the FedEx standings and missed the Tour Championship and all its riches by just a few points. So he knows how valuable every point is. He just didn't have his A game on Sunday, however, as he began the final round with a two-stroke lead but wound up solo fifth after a 3-over 75. Still, it's another great finish at the start of the season for Long, who last week tied for 13th at the U.S. Open. He's up to a career-high 60th OWGR.
 
Justin Suh
Last summer, there were four decorated golfers coming out of college onto the PGA Tour. You know Collin Morikawa, Matthew Wolff and Viktor Hovland. You may not know Suh, the former No. 1 -ranked amateur who struggled mightily upon turning pro after an all-American career at Southern Cal. He missed cut after cut, in part because of a wrist injury. He turned to the Latinoamerica Tour, where he has thrived with seven top-10s in the past year. He tied for 14th at the Corales, his best finish ever on the PGA Tour and only third made cut in 14 starts. 

Henrik Stenson
You had to wonder what Stenson was even doing in the Dominican Republic. Maybe he was looking to find his game, which has been non-existent throughout 2020. He tied for 21st, which, in this field, tells us very little about the state of Stenson's play. But he'll be back at it this week at the Sanderson Farms. You never know, these weak, early-season fall events could make a huge difference points-wise come the 2021 FedEx Cup playoffs. And also for staying inside the top-50 OWGR at year's end. Stenson right now is ranked 44th.

Thomas Detry
The 27-year-old Belgian stuck around after the U.S. Open. He opened with two rounds in the 60s but couldn't follow that up and wound up tied for 33rd, exactly where he finished last year at Puntacana. He was one of the stars of the European Tour's UK Swing over the summer with two runners-up. After a tie for 49th at Winged Foot, you'd have to say it was a successful visit to the States for Detry.

Will Zalatoris
No matter the field, just making the cut after a grueling week at a major is no small task. And if you were grinding deep into Sunday as Zalatoris was at the U.S. Open, even more so. He barely made the cut at Puntacana and meandered through three rounds. So finding an extra gear on Sunday was impressive. He shot a 7-under 65, the best round of the day, to zoom up the leaderboard and tie for eighth. He's still a Korn Ferry player with very few PGA Tour playing options, but he'll have the option to play next week at the Sanderson Farms thanks to his top-10. He moved to 70th OWGR, his personal high.

Joohyung Kim
The 18-year-old South Korean tied for 33rd. Even though it was a very weak field, it was stronger than the ones he was facing in Asia. After missing the cut at the PGA Championship, he made it to the weekend at the Safeway and now again this week. Don't know when we'll see Kim again, but he's shown enough to feel good about his game on the best tour in golf.

Akshay Bhatia
Bhatia couldn't follow up on his first made cut on the PGA Tour, missing the weekend by a shot at Puntacana.  He was top-10 at the season-opening Safeway, but couldn't back it up in a weaker field. That's to be expected of an 18-year-old. One step forward, one step back. He is not in the field at the Sanderson.

John Catlin
The 29-year-old California playing in Asia and Europe won for the second time in three weeks on the European Tour. He followed up a win at the Andalucia Masters with a victory at the Irish Open. The field wasn't great in either event -- the strength of field in Ireland was only 50, weaker even than Puntacana. Still, Catlin has soared from outside the top-200 in the world rankings to inside the top-100 for the first time, at a career-best 84th. He now has 10 worldwide wins, all the others coming in Asia. He's never been in a major and only once in a WGC. You have to think the former University of New Mexico Lobo would like to get to the PGA Tour, so we could be seeing him at some point. That doesn't mean play him, just look for him.