Lahiri takes second as Smith, Rippers ensure sweep at LIV Bedminster

He is yet to earn a breakthrough win but Anirban Lahiri is making a mark at LIV Golf. After a joint second place on debut at Boston last year, the India star has gone close twice this season, most recently at LIV Golf Bedminster, where he finished second to Australia’s Cameron Smith over the weekend.

Having shared the runner-up spot at Adelaide earlier in the year, Lahiri went one better in New Jersey on Sunday where he had the weekend’s best round of 7 under par 64 to follow a 3 over 74 on the first day, and a closing 70 to pick up a $2.25 million cheque for his efforts.

Lahiri produced two birdies late in his round that helped push him up the leaderboard and gave him a cent percent scrambling record on the final day – six for six. The Bedminster result helped the Crushers rally and finish second in the team race, and also pushed the Bangalore golfer up to 15th in the season-long points standings. The Bedminster limelight though was reserved for Australia.

Last month in London, Smith won the individual title but his team, Ripper GC, came up one stroke short of forcing a playoff when a missed par putt on the final hole left Smith and his team stranded. On Sunday, Smith and his all-Australian Rippers left nothing to chance. 

While Smith coasted to a seven-shot victory over the second-placed Lahiri, the Rippers won their first-ever team title by 11 strokes, the biggest team margin of victory this season.

“I won a couple of weeks ago in London, and I wasn’t happy with the way that I won,” Smith said later. “… I didn’t want the same thing to happen today. It's something that I've worked for, something that was a goal of mine at the start of the year was to be up there with at least a chance for the last event,” Smith said, who won for the third time in 15 LIV starts dating back to last year.

Starting the day with a four-shot lead, Smith overcame a shaky early phase and pulled away with a stretch of four birdies in five holes midway through his round. There was a brief period when a showdown with six-time major winner Phil Mickelson loomed but once Smith had got past that, it was smooth sailing all the way.

The 2022 Open champion’s 3 under 68 left him at 12 under 202 as he won by seven strokes over Crusher GC’s Lahiri. Abraham Ancer, Patrick Reed and Dean Burmester tied for third on 4 under, with Ancer claiming the third-place points finish with the better final round. Smith’s winning margin was the largest in LIV Golf history, bettering the six-stroke victory by Bryson DeChambeau last week at Greenbrier. 

The result also moved Smith into first place in the individual standings and with two regular-season events left, Smith now leads three-time winner Talor Gooch by 21 points. Third placed Partick Reed is well behind the two leaders and well out of the race.

On Sunday, Smith’s Ripper teammates were happy to join him atop the podium on Sunday for the first time. “Just the satisfaction of being able to celebrate a win with some of your best mates in the world,” said Marc Leishman. “… We got close in London as a team, but it was a weird feeling on the 18th green.

“For us to pull ahead as a team and be able to celebrate on that 18th green an individual victory, a team victory, eight happy blokes ¬– caddies, teams, everything ¬– it was more than that. That's what LIV Golf is all about, that team side of it, and just celebrating together.”

Besides Smith’s 68, the key contribution for the Rippers on Sunday came from the 23-year-old Jediah Morgan, who bounced back from a second-round 78 to shoot a 5 under 66, the low round of the day. Morgan had three birdies during a four-hole stretch on his first nine, then eagled the par-5 eighth and birdied the par-4 ninth late in his round.

“I was not very happy with myself after yesterday. To shoot 7 over and just kind of let myself down and obviously these guys down a bit, it annoyed me a little bit,” said Morgan, who spoke to his father after Saturday’s round. 

“I just had to let some emotion out. To come back – I didn’t change anything today. I just played better. Today was awesome. I didn't look at the leaderboards all day, and then my caddie on the last hole just said, mate, we've got a 10-shot lead, and I was like, you're kidding. Yeah, it's been nice.”

Added Matt Jones, whose 1-under 70 was the other contributing score Sunday: “I think all of us will say that we're very more than happy for Jed to be doing that because we all know what he can do. We all believe in what he can do.”

Although the Rippers are mathematically out of the running for the top four spots in the team standings, they will enter the final stretch of the 2023 season with plenty of momentum. Last year, they finished second in the team championship.

Final team scores

1. Ripper GC (-20): Jediah Morgan 66, Cameron Smith 68, Matt Jones 70 
2. Crushers GC (-9): Bryson DeChambeau 68, Anirban Lahiri 70, Charles Howell III 71 
3. Stinger GC (-9): Branden Grace 71, Dean Burmester 72, Charl Schwartzel 72
4. RangeGoats GC (-8): Harold Varner III 69, Thomas Pieters 71, Talor Gooch 72 
5. HyFLyers GC (-7): Brendan Steele 70, Cameron Tringale 71, James Piot 71 
6. 4Aces GC (-1): Patrick Reed 71, Dustin Johnson 71, Pat Perez 70
7. Torque GC (E): Joaquin Niemann 69, Mito Pereira 70, David Puig 71
8. Fireballs GC (E): Abraham Ancer 69, Eugenio Chacarra 73, Sergio Garcia 73 
9. Cleeks GC (+3): Richard Bland 70, Graeme McDowell 70, Bernd Wiesberger 74
10. Iron Heads GC (+11): Sihwan Kim 70, Kevin Na 73, Scott Vincent 76
11. Smash GC (+15): Brooks Koepka 72, Chase Koepka 74, Jason Kokrak 74
12. Majesticks GC (+16): Henrik Stenson 73, Laurie Canter 75, Ian Poulter 75

Also Read: Matsuyama maintains FedEx Playooffs record with flying St Jude finish

Also Read: Glover takes over from Speith as St Jude leader, Im charges into tied third