Scottie Scheffler will return to the top of the world rankings on Monday after powering clear to win The PLAYERS Championship, his sixth PGA Tour title.
The American began the final round with a two-shot lead that was cut to one after the first hole, but five birdies in a row around the turn meant he was out of reach unless finding trouble.
At Sawgrass that's sometimes possible, a fact underlined by rookie Taylor Montgomery who dropped seven shots from the 15th to the 17th, but not for Scheffler, who limited the damage to a bogey when a bad swing did arrive at the 14th.
Walking off that green he was still five ahead of Tyrrell Hatton, whose final-round 65 had already seen him cover the back-nine in a record 29 strokes and post a clubhouse target that would prove beyond the reach of all bar one player.
Scheffler though never looked like failing to answer that question and went on to earn a winner's prize of $4.5 million, with Hatton earning the biggest cheque of his career in second place.
Victory was sealed when he fired a wedge to 10 feet at the 17th, which had seen Tommy Fleetwood and Cam Davis both find water in the group ahead but proved no problem for the champion.
In winning, Scheffler became just the fourth player to capture a sixth PGA Tour title within 400 days of his first, one of the sport's many statistical tables which is led by Tiger Woods.
Scheffler will now bid to do something Woods managed almost 20 years ago and successfully defend the WGC Match Play back home in Texas, before heading to Augusta to attempt to do the same in the Masters.
