Tour
August 5, 2018 - 6:15 pm EDT 6 years ago

Emotional JT Wins WGC-Bridgestone

Chris Chaney Chris Chaney

Justin Thomas won the last edition of the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational by four strokes over Kyle Stanley. JT shot rounds of 65-64-67-69 to best a field that featured every one of the top-50 players in the world.


“When I had my putt, I kind of marked it and I turned around and I just happened to see my parents, saw my grandma and grandpa,” Thomas said. “I just got a huge knot in my throat and I just had to put my head down. I’ve never gotten like that on the golf course before.”

“My dad is 86, I believe, and my mom is right behind him,” Mike Thomas, Justin’s father and coach, said. “She was born on February 29, Leap Year, so she claims she’s like 17.

“That was the coolest thing,” he added. “I mean, my parents are old, and they’re not going to be here a lot longer, and for them to get to see that—we had two sheriffs and police driving them around out there today. I don’t know how they got hooked up with those two guys.”

Sunday at Firestone Country Club offered a handful of players making moves at Thomas, but the tree-lined Akron, Ohio course rejected any serious contenders for Thomas’ title. The 25-year-old Kentucky native earned his third PGA Tour victory of the season and the ninth of his career. He heads to St. Louis next week to defend his lone major championship title to date. 

Playing in the final edition of the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, Tiger Woods shot disappointing back-to-back weekend rounds of 3-over par 73 to finish in a tie for 31st at even par. World No. 1 Dustin Johnson shot a final-round 6-under par 64 to move 19 spots up the leaderboard into a tie for third alongside Thorbjørn Olesen. 

Brooks Koepka finished in solo fifth place while Rory McIroy, Aaron Wise, Anirban Lahiri and Patrick Cantlay finished tied for sixth. Jason Day, Ian Poulter, Tony Finau and Si Woo Kim rounded out the top-10 in a four-way tie for 10th place.