2024 St. Jude Championship leaderboard, grades: Hideki Matsuyama survives back nine to win FedEx Cup opener

Hideki Matsuyama officially notched his 10th PGA Tour victory by first running away before coming back to the field as he stood tough to win the 2024 St. Jude Championship.

Matsuyama finished the week at 17 under for a two-stroke victory over Xander Schauffele and Viktor Hovland, scoring birdies across his last two holes to create the winning margin. He also won the first leg of the 2024 FedEx Cup Playoffs, his first such victory in the PGA Tour postseason.

Climbing to third place in the FedEx Cup standings -- a personal best this late into the season -- Matsuyama would begin the Tour Championship three shots back of Scottie Scheffler should he maintain his positioning through next week's BMW Championship. 

Matsuyama is the sixth player to win multiple times this season, and that is beyond the bronze medal he claimed at the 2024 Paris Olympics just a couple weeks ago. The postseason title gets added to a résumé that already included wins at the Masters, Memorial and Genesis Invitational with a pair of World Golf Championships to boot. His 10 PGA Tour trophies are accompanied by eight others from the Japan Golf Tour; he now approaches 20 worldwide victories.

The 32-year-old entered the final round in Memphis holding the largest 54-hole lead of the season at five strokes. Having already claimed the largest final-round comeback this year with his six-stroke win at Riviera in February, Matsuyama knew there was still work to be done despite his Sunday morning advantage.

Going back-and-forth on the practice putting green between his newly introduced putter and an old gamer, Matsuyama made the decision to keep feeding the hot hand. Though he led the field in strokes gained approach and strokes gained putting through three rounds, his firepower subsided Sunday.

Enjoying a hefty diet of pars through his first seven holes, Matsuyama's margin was cut to four by his playing partner Nick Dunlap. With Dunlap's tee shot on the par-3 8th settling inside 10 feet and Matsuyama's outside 35 feet, it appeared the lead would be cut to three as the two walked off the tee. However, the faith in the new putter paid off for Matsuyama as he connected from distance and instead ballooned his lead back to five.

It would remain at that margin until the back nine where charges were made by big names like Schauffele, Hovland and Scheffler. They appeared to be for naught until life was injected into the tournament on the par-4 12th where Matsuyama had a brief discussion with a rules official that appeared to take him out of rhythm. 

His first bogey of the round soon followed, and the mistakes would pile up from there. Hitting his ball in the water on the par-3 14th, Matsuyama did well to only drop just one shot before giving up a pair the next hole. Suddenly, the five-stroke lead was entirely relinquished when Hovland made birdie two holes ahead to push the reigning FedEx Cup champion to 16 under.

With Schauffele in the clubhouse at 15 under following a final-round 63, a score was set for Matsuyama and Hovland to best. The Norwegian faltered as his short-game woes arrived at the most inopportune time; he failed to get a relatively straight forward up-and-down for par on No. 17 to drop into a three-way tie at the top.

It was that same green where, moments later, Matsuyama regained control of the tournament. Facing an unlikely birdie bid, he converted his fifth putt from outside 25 feet on the week when his ball found the bottom of the cup. 

With Hovland missing his 9-foot effort on the last, Matsuyama needed only a par to secure the title. He did one better knocking in a rare birdie on the par-4 18th to put a bow on what was anything but a stress-free Sunday in Memphis. Grade: A+

Here are the grades for the rest of the notables on the leaderboard at the 2024 St. Jude Championship.

T2. Viktor Hovland (-15): Hovland warned us that he had no idea when everything was going to click for him. It clicked at TPC Southwind. The most encouraging part is that Hovland finished among the top five in strokes gained on approach and off the tee, a remarkable deviation from most of his year. After starting the St. Jude Championship sitting 57th in the FedEx Cup standings, his T2 finish moves him all the way to 16th. He easily advances to the BMW Championship where he returns to try and defend his title. At that spot, he's also a threat to sneak his way into the Tour Championship two weeks from now where he would be attempting to go back to back as well. Grade: A-

4. Scottie Scheffler (-13): No harm, no foul for Scheffler, who easily maintains his No. 1 position in the FedExCup standings going to the last two playoff events. The important point for him is that nobody in the top five won, and Schauffele did not really make up all that much ground. Scheffler still has a 1,500-point lead on Schauffele, and he will almost certainly be the No. 1 seed at the Tour Championship where he would start at 10 under. The scenario for Schauffele to catch him at the BMW Championship next week would require a tournament victory. Grade: B+

T5. Nick Dunlap (-14): On the one-year anniversary of his U.S. Amateur victory, Dunlap nearly won for the third time as a professional. It was during a crucial week as he started the tournament outside the top 50 in the standings and required a monstrous performance to advance into the BMW Championship. We can quibble with a number of different things with his game right now, but the bottom line is that he's 20, already an above-average iron player on the PGA Tour and contends for victories seemingly all the time as a pro. Who knows where Dunlap's career will eventually end up, but this is an extraordinary start, even if it's being overlooked for bigger and splashier storylines. Grade: A

T68. Rory McIlroy (+9): It was a strange week for McIlroy, but everything has been a bit off since he kicked away the U.S. Open in June. He tied Jordan Spieth for 68th, which doesn't sound terrible until you remember that there were only 70 golfers in the field. McIlroy subsequently dropped just three spots in the FedEx Cup standings, which is certainly not insurmountable but nevertheless a bummer of a start for somebody who has had another terrific season overall. Grade: D-