‘Fearless’ Brandt Snedeker’s 10th tour win and first in 8 years sends him to PGA Championship

Brandt Snedeker received a text message from his daughter Lily on Sunday morning that said three words: “Go play fearless.”

That’s all Lily’s old man needed. Well, that and a little help from someone who was trying to collect his first victory in his 274th PGA Tour start.

Snedeker is now 45. He last won the Wyndham Championship in 2018. That’s 2,821 days ago. It’s four months shy of eight years.

The U.S. Presidents Cup captain has been through a lot since then, including surgery in December 2022 to treat severe manubrium joint instability in his sternum.

But there he was late Sunday at Dunes Golf & Beach Club in Myrtle Beach with tears in his eyes. Twice. He bogeyed the 72nd hole and thought he blew the tournament. But he was handed a gift 20 minutes later when Mark Hubbard bogeyed the last hole to give Snedeker the one-shot victory at the ONEflight Myrtle Beach Classic.

It’s Snedeker 10th PGA Tour title, something he always desperately wanted to achieve. It also gave him the last spot into the PGA Championship field this week at Aronimink.

“There’s points in the last couple of years I didn’t think I could win again,” Snedeker said. “My golf game wasn’t very good. My body wasn’t feeling great. Lots of self-doubt.”

But Snedeker did the only thing he knew how to do—work through it. No excuses. Just find answers. Dig it out of the dirt.

“And every time I did it, I kept getting a little bit better and a little bit better and a little bit better and my confidence started growing, and I felt like I could play,” Snedeker said. “It's been a long last three years. Eight years since I won, but really since I came back from my sternum surgery it's been a long time to feel like this.”

Snedeker’s results may not have looked like he was close to winning, but he was somewhat pleased with them. He’s ranked 273 in the world, so yes, there was still plenty of work to do on limited starts. But there were glimmers of hope.

He tied for ninth place last fall at the Bank of Utah Championship. Then there were four straight missed cut to start this season, which felt like a setback. At the Valspar Championship in March he had a chance to win but played the last seven holes in five over par to shoot 76. He tied for 18th place.

This week in Myrtle Beach he never shot worse than 67, going 67-66-67-66 for an 18-under-par 266 total. Around the turn of the final round he was not in the picture, but a classic Snedeker charge where he made four birdies in six holes moved him to the top.

With plenty of nerves on the 18th tee he blew his tee shot right, had to hack out back into the fairway and failed to get up and down, making bogey.

Snedeker tried to keep his mind occupied on the practice range, while Hubbard finished. The 36-year-old journeyman was trying to make headlines of his own, attempting to win for the first time.