ST. LOUIS — Patrick Cantlay extolled the virtues of patience this week in the BMW Championship, but it was his resilience that earned him a berth in the Tour Championship.
With four bounce-back birdies, the last of which spurred a three-birdie run to close out the final round, Cantlay cobbled together a two-under 68 on Sunday and surged into the FedEx Cup finale at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta. His 14-under 266 total at Bellerive Country Club pushed him past Rory McIlroy into solo second place, three shots behind winner Wyndham Clark.
Cantlay began the week at 43rd, well outside the top 30 on the FedEx Cup points list, and the eight-time tour winner climbed all the way to 19th to reach East Lake for the ninth time in 10 seasons.
“I feel like I did a lot of really good things this week,” the famously stoic Cantlay said. “I hit the ball really well. I hit a lot of quality shots, a lot of quality wedges. I'm coming to a golf course that I played really well at next week. So I'm really pleased with where my game's at and I think I'm trending in the right direction.”
Cantlay was one of three men to climb inside the magic number, joined by Gary Woodland and Scotland’s Robertt MacIntyre.
Woodland, who enjoyed a sort of “home game” this week as a native of Topeka, Kan., located about 3½ hours away, survived a shocking double bogey on the par-4 ninth hole when he topped his tee shot 97 yards into a creek to keep himself inside the cutoff. At the time, he had rallied within a stroke of Clark, but he regrouped and parred in for 69 and 12-under 268 total to finish T-4 with Collin Morikawa. He rose to 18th after starting the week 31st.
Given his battle with post-traumatic stress disorder following brain surgery in 2023, Woodland was more emotional about his effort to reach the Tour Championship for the first time since 2019.
“I'm going to say it's impressive from where I've been, for sure,” Woodland said. “There's definitely weeks out here where I didn't even think I would be here this week. To get to next week, I haven't done it in six years, with everything I battled this year, I'm super proud of myself, I can tell you that.”
MacIntyre had more heavy lifting to do the final day and delivered the low round, a 65. His clutch T-7 finish at 10-under 270 was enough to propel him to 25th in the standings. The left-hander had begun the week 36th and was 33rd before his final-round sprint of six birdies against a lone bogey.
British Open champion Ryan Fox had far from his best stuff this week, finishing T-47 in the 50-man field at two-over 282, but it was enough to cling to the 30th and final Tour Championship berth after starting the week 25th.
“I guess ever since getting on tour it's the one you want to get to,” said the 39-year-old New Zealander. “Last year, I gave myself a good chance and didn't play very well in the playoffs either. I wanted to rectify that this year. Again, I done most of the hard work until the last two weeks and then I made it a little harder on myself today.”
Sungjae Im fell short in his attempt to advance for two straight playoff events and failed to reach the Tour Championship for the first time in eight years. The Korean native slipped to T-10 after a final-round 71.
With three players moving into the top 30, three men were pushed out. Kurt Kitayama, Bud Cauley and Rickie Fowler were omitted from the party after arriving at Bellerive in positions 28-30. Fowler suffered a near miss for the second year in a row. He was 32nd a year ago and 33rd this season.