Hideki Matsuyama shot a bogey-free 9-under 62 Sunday to overcome a six-stroke deficit to win the $20 million Genesis Invitational at The Riviera Country Club by three strokes over Luke List and Will Zalatoris.
Back-to-back birdies on the 15th and 16th holes on 8- and 6-inch putts gave Matsuyama a one-stroke lead over Zalatoris. He added two strokes to his lead when he birdied the 17th hole and Zalatoris, playing two groups behind, bogeyed the 15th.
Matsuyama finished his round by two-putting the 18th hole for a par, falling one stroke short of tying the course record set by Ted Tryba in 1999, completing the tournament at 17-under 267.
Matsuyama was assured of the victory when Zalatoris parred his final two holes. List moved into a share of second by birdieing the 17th hole.
Matsuyama entered Sunday’s play among three golfers tied for seventh, six strokes behind leader Patrick Cantlay, then birdied each of the first three holes to move into sixth, three strokes behind Cantlay, who hadn’t started his round.
Matsuyama parred the next six holes, then birdied the 10, 11th and 12th holes to tie Cantlay for second, one stroke behind List.
List bogeyed the par-4 11th hole to drop into a five-way tie for the lead with Cantlay, Matsuyama, Schauffele and Zalatoris.
Zalatoris birdied the 13th hole to take the lead.
Matsuyama received $4 million for his ninth victory in his 250 starts on the PGA Tour and first since the 2022 Sony Open in Hawaii. The 31-year-old also won eight times on the Japan Golf Tour between 2011 and 2016.
Matsuyama’s nine victories are the most by a Japanese member of the PGA Tour.
Cantlay was among three players tying for fourth, four strokes off the lead, after shooting a 1-over 72. Cantlay parred each of the first nine holes, bogeyed the 10th, birdied 11th, bogeyed the 13th and 15th holes and birdied the 18th.
The 31-year-old former UCLA star who played at the Virginia Country Club in Long Beach as a youth led by one stroke after Thursday’s first round and five after Friday’s second round.
This was the fifth time Cantlay has held a 54-hole lead or co-lead in an individual stroke-play event on the PGA Tour, not including the Tour Championship, where the player with the most FedEx Cup points leading into the tournament starts at 10 under par, the second most at 8-under and down to the 26th through 30th players who start at even par.
Cantlay has two victories with a 54-hole lead or co-lead — the 2021 and 2022 BMW Championships.
Zalatoris was playing in his fourth official PGA Tour event since undergoing back surgery last April. He missed the cut in last month’s Sony Open in Hawaii, tied for 34th in The American Express the following week and tied for 13th in the Farmers Insurance Open the week after that.
Zalatoris did not play the past two weeks.
Zalatoris was last in the field of 20 in the Hero World Challenge, an unofficial event hosted by Tiger Woods, Nov. 30-Dec. 3. Woods is also the host of The Genesis Invitational.
Zalatoris was among four players playing on a sponsor’s exemption in the limited field event which began with 70 players.