PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Rory McIlroy wasn’t perfect. Far from it. But in winning the second Players Championship of his career, McIlroy didn’t need to be.
It took three big shots — a putt on No. 16, a tee shot on the iconic island green and a tap in for bogey on 18— for McIlroy to beat J.J. Spaun in a three-hole playoff on a chilly and windy Monday morning at the Stadium Course. McIlroy was 2 over on Nos. 16, 17 and 18, but Spaun had trouble from the start, the iconic island green sealing his fate. For McIlroy, arguably the most well-known active golfer on the PGA Tour, it could be the launching point to what has started as an incredible 2025. He’s won twice in four starts, and joined Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods and Scottie Scheffler as the only golfers with multiple majors and multiple Players titles.
Recommended Videos
“... I think back in ‘19 I maybe didn’t appreciate how big this tournament was and how much it meant. Every time we come back to this tournament, it gets bigger and better each and every year, from the golf course to the facility for the players, to the facilities for the fans,” McIlroy said. “I don’t want to put any sort of label on it, but it is one of the biggest championships in the world.”
It was the first Players Championship that went into a playoff since 2015 when Rickie Fowler beat Sergio Garcia and Kevin Kisner in a finish that went needed the three holes and then sudden death on No. 17 to decide the winner. This one wasn’t nearly as dramatic.
Conditions on the course were far different than they were throughout the four rounds. Instead of sunny and in the 70s, it was in the mid-50s with winds lashing the course that made it feel colder than it was.
“... I would have preferred not to have played in such gusty conditions this morning,” McIlroy said. “I’m definitely thankful that we didn’t have to play 18 holes in that. It was only three. But yeah, that was as tough as the course had played all week I felt like.”
McIlroy’s experience (it was his sixth time in a playoff) was the difference. With 27 career wins, he was a far more dialed-in golfer than Spaun, and it showed. McIlroy calmly played No. 16, getting on the green and dropping a 7-foot putt for birdie. The tournament was effectively done when McIlroy’s tee shot hit the green safely on the 17th. He wound up three-putting on the slick 17 greens, but it didn’t matter. Spaun struggled from the get-go.
“I felt really good last night. I slept better than I did Saturday night. Slept better than I did Friday night,” Spaun said. “But then when I got to the tee, I was like, ooh, it kind of hit me. ... I don’t know what the difference was. Maybe because I knew it’s do or die maybe. But yeah, I think it was my first Tour playoff, so nothing but positives to take from it.”
The nerves were obvious. Spaun had birdies at No. 16 in three of his four rounds. But his drive Monday went in the rough, then he hit his approach into the bunker and had to scramble to save par. By the time he went to 17 trailing McIlroy by a stroke just like he was in Sunday’s final round, Spaun said he felt good. After seeing McIlroy hit a 9-iron, Spaun pulled an 8-iron and tried to put it on the green where he landed it Sunday.
“I hit the exact shot that I wanted to. I had no idea that that ball was even long,” McIlroy said. “I thought if anything it was short, maybe plugged in the bunker or stuck on top of the hill.”
Spaun’s tee shot wasn’t even close, sailing over the island green and splashing in the water. That led to a triple bogey and essentially but a bow on the title for McIlroy. Spaun said he felt good about his tee shot on the hole, and couldn’t believe the wind took it so far past the green.
McIlroy felt that he had a win slip out of his grasp on Sunday, let down by his putter over the final six holes.
Spaun had a shot to win The Players outright on Sunday, a 31-foot putt on 18 stopping 3 inches from the hole. His read on the difficult 18th was perfect but came up just short. Spaun was solid early in the week with the putter but didn’t hit a putt longer than 7 feet in the final round.
The Players has finished with theater-style drama the last two years. Scottie Scheffler survived last year’s 50th anniversary tournament as his competitors missed putts on the final hole.
Xander Schauffele had his shot to force a playoff in 2024, but couldn’t drain his 61-foot putt on No. 18. British Open champ Brian Harman and U.S. Open winner Wyndham Clark also had their shots on the final hole, too. Harman left his putt 3 feet from the hole. And Clark’s 7-foot putt on 18 was agonizing, going dead at the center before lipping out of the cup. Clark was stunned at the half-circle rim out, the groans from the gallery telling Scheffler all he needed to know.
McIlroy’s first Players win came in 2019 in a one-stroke win over Jim Furyk. Since then, McIlroy has won a dozen more tournaments, including a couple of Tour championship titles and served as the de facto spokesman for the PGA Tour during its years-long battle against LIV Golf. With Tiger Woods’ health struggles, McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler have become the faces of golf.
His start in 2025 has been excellent. McIlroy has played in four PGA and one DP World event this year. He won at Pebble Beach last February and was fourth in Dubai. McIlroy’s worst finish was a T-17 at the Genesis Invitational. Could his sizzling start set things up for his fifth major championship this year? McIlroy has two PGAs, an Open Championship and a U.S. Open on his resume, his final one coming in 2014. McIlroy said he has far more appreciation for The Players than he did after he won his first in 2019.
“It was incredible. I was walking up 16 fairway, and I turned to my caddie Harry, and I was like, I can’t believe how many people are here,” he said. “Obviously no one works in Jacksonville.”
McIlroy’s week initially didn’t start under the most glamourous of events. In a Tuesday practice round, McIlroy whipped his tee shot on No. 18 into the water. A University of Texas golfer in the gallery, later identified as Luke Potter, heckled McIlroy after that shot, making a reference to McIlroy’s collapse in the 2011 Masters.
Instead of blowing it off and moving on, McIlroy confronted Potter and a Texas teammate, yanked his cell phone out of his hand and walked off. Potter was subsequently ejected. In an interview with Golf.com, Potter apologized.
If that event was supposed to foreshadow any sort of fragile mindset for McIlroy, it hardly did. He was superb in the first two rounds and then battled the swirling winds on Saturday, struggling to a 1-over 73 that sank him four strokes off the lead. But he caught back up in a hurry Sunday, moving into lead after a birdie putt on 11 and a 2-over start by Spaun.
“When you don’t get it done — I was disappointed that I needed to come back this morning, but I didn’t — I couldn’t let that mind frame linger for too long, and I had to reset and try to get a good night’s sleep and come out this morning committed to get the job done,” McIlroy said.
