Patty Tavatanakit, Jake Knapp group to win Grant Thornton Invitational

NAPLES, Fla. — Patty Tavatanakit holed a 25-foot birdie putt and Jake Knapp gave them the lead on the subsequent gap with a troublesome pitch to arrange birdie because the UCLA duo mixed for a 7-under 65 on Sunday for a one-shot victory within the Grant Thornton Invitational.

They gained on their respective excursions on the identical day this 12 months — Knapp on the Mexico Open, Tavatanakit on the Honda LPGA Thailand — and had been equally spectacular as a group, particularly down the stretch at Tiburon Golf Membership.

Jeeno Thitikul, who gained the LPGA finale at Tiburon final month for the $4 million prize, holed an 8-foot birdie putt on the ultimate gap as she and Tom Kim shot 64 to complete alone in second.

Akshay Bhatia and Jennifer Kupcho made a large number of the 18th gap for his or her lone bogey within the modified fourballs format and completed third.

The ultimate hour might have gone to any 4 groups — the Canadian tandem of Corey Conners and Brooke Henderson shot 62 and had been briefly tied for the lead, although operating out of holes.

Knapp and Tavatanakit, who began with a two-shot lead, fell behind for the primary time all day when Bhatia holed a 30-foot eagle putt on the par-5 seventeenth.

The format had every participant hit tee pictures, swap balls for the subsequent shot after which full the opening. Knapp’s tee shot on the par-3 sixteenth climbed onto the inexperienced, and Tavatanakit poured within the left-to-right breaking putt for birdie to tie the lead.

“I putted properly this week,” Tavatanakit mentioned. “All the things has been enjoyable. The chemistry has been actually good.”

Each had been out of place off the tee on the straightforward seventeenth, with Knapp within the water. Taking the tee shot of Tavatanakit, he hit from the native space to wanting the inexperienced right into a slight swale. His pitch settled 3 toes away for birdie and a one-shot lead over Bhatia and Kupcho.

Right here’s how the purse was paid out on the Grant Thornton Invitational.

Forward on the 18th, Bhatia’s strategy got here up woefully brief and into the water. Kupcho missed her strategy to the proper, and her putt ran down a slope about 10 toes by. Bhatia tried to play twice from the water. Kupcho badly missed her par putt.

That gave the UCLA tandem a two-shot lead, and a easy par — each missed birdie putts they didn’t want from about 10 toes — put them at 27-under 189. Every collected $500,000 from the $4 million purse.

Kim and Thitikul completed birdie-birdie for second place, value $280,000 to every.