U.S. Open champion J.J. Spaun drains 64-foot putt to seal 1st major at Oakmont

J.J. Spaun arrived at Oakmont Country Club as an unlikely U.S. Open champion, similar to the long odds of him making a 64½-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole.

He somehow made both happen.

Spaun bogeyed five of his first six holes Sunday afternoon, seeming to sink his championship hopes, but he found his stride on the back nine as his competitors melted away in a heavy rain that soaked the historically tough course.

A 34-year-old with one PGA Tour win, Spaun was the only golfer in a field of 156 to finish the tournament under par. He carded a 2-over 72 in Sunday’s final round and finished the tournament 1-under after his long, improbable putt on No. 18.

“It’s definitely like a storybook (or) fairytale ending,” Spaun said. “Kind of an underdog fighting back, not giving up, never quitting. With the rain and everything — and then the putt — I mean, you couldn’t write a better story.”

How historic was the final-round 32 he carded on the back nine Sunday? It’s the second lowest by a U.S. Open champion at Oakmont, right between Johnny Miller’s 31 in 1973 and Ben Hogan’s 33 in 1953.

Spaun won by two strokes over Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre, who shot a 2-under 68 on Sunday to finish the tournament 1-over.

The major title was Spaun’s first, continuing an Oakmont tradition. Seven of the nine previous U.S. Open champions crowned at Oakmont were also first-time major winners.

Him winning seemed all but impossible as Spaun walked up the seventh fairway, reeling from a string of five bogeys in six holes. No previous U.S. Open champion had ever carded a front-nine score in the 40s in the final round, yet Spaun did — and still won.

“I felt like, as bad as things were going, I just still tried to just commit to every shot,” Spaun said. “I tried to just continue to dig deep. I’ve been doing it my whole life. I think that’s been the biggest difference this year, being able to do that. Fortunately, I dug very deep on the back nine, and things went my way, and here we are with the trophy.”

Spaun clawed back into contention with a steady driver and a hot putter, making birdies on Nos. 12, 14, 17 and 18, with his lone back-nine bogey on 15. He rolled in a 40-foot putt for birdie on No. 12, and followed with a 22-footer on 14.

He birdied the crucial 17th hole in all four rounds, this time driving the green on the 309-yard, par 4. He two-putted from just inside of 18 feet, the second a 3½-footer for birdie, dropping him to even par.

Spaun walked to the 18th tee with a one-stroke lead and found the fairway with a 308-yard drive. His approach shot safely found the green, but landed far to the left, well away from a pin placement on the right.

MacIntyre was already in the clubhouse, so Spaun could’ve won with two putts and a par. Instead, Spaun clinched the U.S. Open with a birdie from 64 feet, 5 inches.

“I didn’t look at the scoreboard,” Spaun said. “I knew based off of like what the crowd was saying that I felt like, if I two-putted, I would probably win. … But I didn’t want to play defensive. I didn’t know if I had a two-shot lead. I didn’t want to do anything dumb.”

Only four other U.S. Open champions had a birdie-birdie finish: Hogan at Oakmont in 1953; Jack Nicklaus at Baltusrol in 1980; Tom Watson at Pebble Beach in 1982; and Jon Rahm at Torrey Pines in 2021.

All around him, Spaun’s rivals were tumbling down the leaderboard.

Third-round leader Sam Burns shot an 8-over round Sunday and finished the week at 4-over. Former Masters winner Adam Scott, who started the day tied for second with Spaun, carded a 9-over round Sunday and finished at 6-over.

Heavy rain soaked Oakmont and delayed the U.S. Open for 96 minutes early Sunday evening. When play resumed shortly before 6 p.m., the wet, sloppy conditions were a factor.

“Look, it just wasn’t easy out there,” said Scott, who carded four bogeys and a double bogey on the back nine. “All things being equal, it’s Sunday of the U.S. Open, one of the hardest setups, and the conditions were the hardest of the week. Thank God it wasn’t like this all week.”

Frustrations were rising. Burns slammed his club into the soggy turf after one errant shot, and Tyrrell Hatton was left talking to himself after two failed wedge shots derailed his run to the top.

“It’s tough,” Burns said. “The conditions were extremely difficult. I didn’t have my best stuff today. Yeah, it was really difficult.”

Norway’s Viktor Hovland finished 2-over, while Hatton, Cameron Young and Mexico’s Carlos Ortiz finished tied at 3-over.

At one point Sunday there was a five-way tie for the lead at 1-over when the final pairing of Burns and Scott were on the tee at No. 13. Spaun, Hatton and Ortiz also were 1-over. Two others, Hovland and MacIntyre, were one shot back.

“There was no faking, there was no hiding since Thursday,” said Spaun, whose resume before now was dotted with near misses. “I think that’s what I’ve been able to overcome. I’m not trying to shy away from the moment.

“Like I just tell myself, if I can do this when there’s no pressure or no lead, like why can’t I do it when there is? It’s just trying to get over that line of handling the nerves and handling pressure. I really showed myself a lot today on that back nine.”

The win was his first since the 2022 Valero Texas Open, but he’d come close to breaking through four times this year, including losing the Players Championship in a playoff to Rory McIlroy. He also tied for second at the Cognizant Classic, third at the Sony Open and sixth at the Charles Schwab.

Spaun entered Sunday at 2-under, trailing the leader by only one shot. That was until Spaun bogeyed Nos. 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6, in what was just a continuation of his already chaotic day.

“I was running to CVS in downtown because my daughter had a stomach bug and was vomiting all night long,” Spaun said. “I was just like, ‘OK, my wife was up at 3 a.m.,’ and she’s like, ‘Violet is vomiting all over. She can’t keep anything down.’ It was kind of a rough start to the morning.

“I’m not blaming that on my start, but it kind of fit the mold of what was going on — the chaos.”