CRANS MONTANA, Switzerland (AP) \u2014 Thriston Lawrence of South Africa overcame a six-shot deficit Sunday with an 8-under 62 and denied Paul Casey his first victory in five years by making an 18-foot birdie putt on the fourth playoff hole to win the European Masters.<\/p>\n
Casey stood over a putt with the chance to win four times on the 18th green at Crans-sur-Sierre, three of them in the playoff. Lawrence made good on his first chance, pumping his arms when his birdie putt dropped. He became the seventh three-time winner of this event, and the first since Seve Ballesteros.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just fought so hard today,\u201d Lawrence said. \u201cI feel for Paul. He played great golf. It looked like it was his all day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Casey started with a three-shot lead and fell behind as Lawrence put on a dynamic charge. Casey regained the lead with a 15-foot birdie putt on the 15th, saved par with a 15-foot putt on the par-3 16th and came to the 18th with a one-shot lead.<\/p>\n
And then the 49-year-old from England appeared to get an enormous break. His shot from the right rough came out heavy. It landed short of the stream and hit a rock that propelled it over the water and into deep rough. But it was a nasty lie and he could only chip out to 20 feet. His par putt to win the tournament caught the left lip.<\/p>\n
Casey shot 68 to join Lawrence on 18-under 262.<\/p>\n
Casey had a 35-foot birdie putt for the win on the first playoff hole at No. 18. On the second extra hole, his 10-foot birdie narrowly missed to the right. Officials moved the pin toward the back of the green, and Casey had 8 feet for birdie and the win. That spun off the right edge.<\/p>\n
The fourth time around, Lawrence made the winning putt to capture the European Masters for the third time in the last five years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s just the best feeling in the world,\u201d Lawrence said.<\/p>\n
Harry Hall of England closed with a 63 and finished alone in third. Patrick Reed (66) tied for 11th, slightly expanding his lead over Rory McIlroy in the Race to Dubai.<\/p>\n
McIlroy returns next week at the Irish Open.<\/p>\n
See AP\u2019s full golf coverage here<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CRANS MONTANA, Switzerland (AP) \u2014 Thriston Lawrence of South Africa overcame a six-shot deficit Sunday with an 8-under…","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"csco_display_header_overlay":false,"csco_singular_sidebar":"","csco_page_header_type":"","csco_page_load_nextpost":"","csco_post_video_location":[],"csco_post_video_location_hash":"","csco_post_video_url":"","csco_post_video_bg_start_time":0,"csco_post_video_bg_end_time":0,"csco_post_video_bg_volume":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[207,151,152,54,3941,3939,148,1668,150,17,3940,3942],"class_list":["post-11194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rory-mcilroy","tag-harry-hall","tag-package-100024-ap-online","tag-package-100502-member-choice-sports-option","tag-patrick-reed","tag-paul-casey","tag-paul-casey-european-masters-thriston-lawrence-switzerland","tag-product-30599-ap-sports-news-s-wire-only","tag-product-32561-ap-online-golf-tournament-stories-and-results","tag-product-32562-ap-online-other-sports-news","tag-rory-mcilroy","tag-switzerland","tag-thriston-lawrence","cs-entry","cs-video-wrap"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/vive.im\/@fogolf\/117228000036576861","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fogolf.com\/pros\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}