Extra holes
PGA Championship 2023: Here's the playoff format used to settle a tie at Oak Hill
Gary Kellner
As you’re watching the final round of the PGA Championship and seeing the potential for the leaderboard to get crowded at Oak Hill if leader Brooks Koepka stumbles, you might be asking yourself a simple question:
What if there’s a tie for the lead after 72 holes?
Naturally, there will be playoff to decide who walks off with the Wanamaker Trophy. But unlike at a standard PGA Tour event, the PGA Championship playoff isn’t a sudden-death contest. Instead, the PGA of America employs a three-hole aggregate-score playoff to determine a winner. All those players who are tied will play the 14th, 15th and 18th holes at Southern Hills. The low score among the players when you add up all three holes is the winner.
But what if there’s still a tie after the three holes? Then the PGA of America does switch to hole-by-hole sudden death. The players remaining go back to the 18th hole and, if necessary, back again to the 18th, 14th and 15th holes, repeating that loop until somebody finally emerges as the champion.
The last time there was a playoff in the PGA Championship was just last year, when Justin Thomas outlasted Will Zalatoris at Southern Hills.
Interestingly, all four men's majors employee different playoff formats. The Open Championship uses a four-hole aggregate playoff while the U.S. Open goes with two holes after previous implementing an 18-hole playoff should there be a tie at the end of regulation. Meanwhile, the Masters uses a simple sudden-death hole-by-hole format for its playoff.
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