Battling a crowded leaderboard on Sunday, Evan Harmeling emerged victorious for his first Korn Ferry Tour title, winning in a playoff over Kevin Dougherty. After making a 10-foot birdie putt on the 72^nd hole to force a playoff, Harmeling won with a birdie on the first playoff hole.

Harmeling entered the final round with a one-shot lead, but fell back with bogeys on Nos. 7, 8 and 12 to sit at 18-under. Dougherty seemed to take control of the situation with six birdies through his first 15 holes for a two-shot lead, but an untimely bogey on the par-3 17^th brought Harmeling back into the conversation. Paired together in the final group, Dougherty’s lead was cut to one with one hole left to play.

After both players hit their third shots to approximately 10 feet on the par-5 18^th, Harmeling made his birdie putt first to put the pressure on Dougherty, posting at 21-under 267.

“It really wasn’t a difficult putt,” Harmeling said. “It was just right outside edge from about 12 feet or so. It was nice that I got to go first. That was huge.”

Needing to sink his birdie putt for the win, Dougherty’s putt missed above the hole and the two headed back to No. 18 for a sudden-death playoff.

Following a perfect drive on the first extra hole, Harmeling continued to put the pressure on Dougherty, hitting his second shot to 10 feet. After finding the fairway bunker with his tee shot, Dougherty was forced to layup and failed to stick his third shot close, hitting it to 25 feet. Dougherty was unsuccessful with his birdie attempt, leaving Harmeling with an easy two-putt victory.

“I thought I did a good job of staying hungry,” said Harmeling. “I came out attacking. I definitely wasn’t comfortable coming out here with a one-shot lead. I liked the mindset that I had.”

Harmeling matched the 72-hole scoring record at 21-under 267 in the third edition of the Savannah Golf Championship. The Princeton University grad recorded the first top-10 finish in his rookie season and moved to No. 32 on the Korn Ferry Tour points list. 

Dougherty recorded his third career runner-up finish on the Korn Ferry Tour and his first top-10 of the season. Despite the disappointing finish, the 29-year-old will be looking forward to his wedding next week in California, where he will be reunited with his fiancée after two months on the road.

The Korn Ferry Tour heads to Orange County National Golf Center and Lodge in Orlando, Florida, next week for the Orange County National Championship presented by Knight 39.  

SUNDAY NOTES:

* Sunday’s weather: Cloudy with a high of 73. Wind N/NE at 7-14 mph.  

* This week’s purse was $600,000 with $108,000 going to the champion Evan Harmeling. He also received 500 Korn Ferry Tour points.

* With the victory, Harmeling moved up 82 spots to 32^nd on the Korn Ferry Tour points list.

* Harmeling became the fifth 36-hole leader/co-leader and 11^th 54-hole leader/co-leader to go on and win this season.

* With the victory, Harmeling became the 16^th first-time winner on Tour this season.

* Harmeling joined David Kocher (El Bosque Mexico Championship by INNOVA) and Brandon Wu (Korn Ferry Tour Championship presented by United Leasing & Finance) as rookie winners on Tour this season.

* The victory came in Harmeling’s 20^th Korn Ferry Tour start.

* Prior to his victory, Harmeling’s best Korn Ferry Tour finish was a T14 at the 2020 WinCo Foods Portland Open presented by KraftHeinz.

* Prior to this week, Kevin Dougherty (P2, 21-under) had finished runner-up twice on the Korn Ferry Tour (T2/2018 Simmons Bank Open for the Snedeker Foundation, P2/2019 Wichita Open Supporting Wichita’s Youth).

* The event became the third event of the season to be decided in a playoff (El Bosque Mexico Championship, Utah Championship presented by Zions Bank).

* Brett Coletta finished the week T3 at 19-under 269. The Australian also finished T3 at the 2019 Savannah Golf Championship.

* Competing as an amateur this week, Noah Norton finished T66 at 6-under 282.

* The combined 2020-21 Korn Ferry Tour schedule will conclude with 25 PGA TOUR cards awarded at the 2021 WinCo Foods Portland Open presented by KraftHeinz, with an additional 25 cards awarded at the conclusion of the 2021 Korn Ferry Tour Finals.

* The par-4 ninth hole (480 yards) played as the hardest hole throughout the week with a scoring average of 4.307.

* The par-4 fifth hole (320 yards) played as the easiest hole throughout the week with a scoring average of 3.398.