Watney Wins The Barclays
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The Barclays serves as the kickoff to the FedExCup Playoffs. The top-125 players on the final Regular Season FedExCup points list (following the Wyndham
Championship) qualified for The Barclays. The top 100 on the points list following The Barclays qualified for the Deutsche Bank Championship. The top-70 players on the FedExCup points list after the Deutsche Bank Championship advance to the
BMW Championship, contested at Crooked Stick GC in Indianapolis, Ind., for the first time. Each playoff event offers 2,500 FedExCup points to the winner. The top-30 players following the BMW Championship will qualify for the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola. Prior to the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola, a points reset will take place, giving all players in the field a mathematical opportunity to win the FedExCup title. The top-five players control their own destiny and would claim the FedExCup with a victory at East Lake. Any player in the field at The Barclays can mathematically move inside the top five in the points standings with a runner-up finish or victory.
After entering the day two strokes behind 54-hole leader Sergio Garcia, Nick Watney
carded a final-round 2-under 69 to defeat Brandt Snedeker (70) by three strokes. Garcia (75) and Dustin Johnson (68) were four shots back. Watney’s fifth PGA TOUR victory comes at the age of 31 years, 4 months and 1 day in his 214th career start.
Watney collects 2,500 points and moves from No. 49 to No. 1 in the FedExCup standings, with 3,225 points. He leads Brandt Snedeker by 532 points.
Watney moves into the top 10 in FedExCup points for the first time this season. He finished the 2011 FedExCup ranked No. 9 after starting the Playoffs ranked No. 1.
The runner-up finish for Brandt Snedeker is the third of his career, with his last coming at the 2010 Farmers Insurance Open. He owns three PGA TOUR victories. Snedeker moves from No. 19 to No. 2 in the FedExCup. With his runner-up finish on Sunday, Brandt Snedeker has finished inside the top five in four of his last seven Playoffs events. The others came at the 2011 Deutsch Bank Championship (T3), The Barclays 2011 (T3) and the 2010 Deutsche Bank Championship (T5).
Just one week after winning the Wyndham Championship (his eighth PGA TOUR victory), Sergio Garcia carried a two-stroke lead into the final round of The Barclays but a final-round 4-over 75 left him four strokes behind champion Nick Watney. Garcia was seeking to become the first player to win back-to-back PGA TOUR events since Tiger Woods in 2009 (Buick Open, World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational). With the T3 finish, Garcia jumps from No. 33 to No. 10 in the FedExCup standings. He fell as far as No. 108 in the standings this season and entered the Wyndham Championship at No. 102. His career-best position in the standings was No. 2 following a P2 at The Barclays in 2008.
Tiger Woods’ 76 in the final round of The Barclays ties for his second-highest score when entering the final round T10 or better (he was T10 after 54 holes this week). In 2007 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by MasterCard, Woods was T10 after 54 holes and shot 76 to finish T22. At the 1998 Arnold Palmer Invitational, Woods was T2 after 54 holes and shot 77 to finish T13. Woods, the TOUR’s only three-time winner this season, has now posted an over-par final round six times in 12 tries this season. He finished T38 this week in his seventh start at The Barclays (best finish was T2 in 2009).
