J.J. Spaun Weathers Oakmont, Wins U.S. Open

Spaun, an afterthought for most of the final round as he started the day with three consecutive bogeys and four in the first five holes, made the turn at five-over 40.

The eventual winner was four shots back of Burns at that point. He would be the first player in U.S. Open history to start his round with three consecutive holes over par and win the championship.

“It just, it felt like, as bad as things were going, I just still tried to just commit to every shot. I tried to just continue to dig deep. I've been doing it my whole life,” Spaun said after his win. “I think that's been the biggest difference this year has been being able to do that. Fortunately, I dug very deep on the back nine, and things went my way, and here we are with the trophy.”

As Spaun made his back-nine run of 3-under 32 — the ninth-lowest back-nine score of a final round in U.S. Open history — the others in the pack started to fall away.

Hatton was on Spaun’s heels until a bogey-bogey finish and a 2-over 37 finish on the final nine holes.

The bogey on the 17^th for Hatton found the side wall of the greenside bunker, and the Englishman was left with an impossible shot to get the ball on the green.

“I feel like for the most part I played pretty well, although I did struggle a little bit on the restart with missing a few shots right, but I feel like I managed that well,” Hatton said. “The finish at the end hurts a lot. If you're going to miss the 17th with that pin, you have to miss it right. I did my bit. I feel like I was extremely unlucky to finish where it did.”

Ortiz would double-bogey the 15^th hole and never recover, shooting a 1-over 36 on the back nine.

Burns and Scott made catastrophic mistakes down the stretch, with Burns finishing with a 5-over 40 and Scott one worse, carding a 41 on the back nine.

“I was kind of annoyed at myself. I hit a really weak putt on like the sixth, and then I felt like, oh, I've let one go there, better toughen up a little bit and not do that,” Scott said. “It was just so sloppy the rest of the way. Sam (Burns), we must have looked horrible, both of us playing like that. But that's what can happen in these things. If you get a little off, you're just severely punished. “

While the original pack was falling away, Robert MacIntyre finished at 1-over, three groups ahead of Spaun, and set the clubhouse lead.

But Spaun was up to the challenge, just missing eagle on the 17th hole and settling for birdie for a one-shot lead over the Scotsman. Then Spaun made the longest putt of the week by any competitor — 64 feet 5 inches — to shut the door on the final combatant.

“The back nine was just all about fighting,” MacIntyre said after his runner-up finish. “Obviously, the rain delay. My previous rain-delay comebacks haven't been strong. Today was a day that I said to myself, why not? Why not it be me today? When I was going round and I just trusted myself, trusted my caddie Mike, trusted all the work that I've done, and we're sitting here in the clubhouse nicely and just wait and see.”