{"id":6933,"date":"2025-12-08T08:20:42","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T01:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/?p=6933"},"modified":"2025-12-08T08:20:44","modified_gmt":"2025-12-08T01:20:44","slug":"matsuyama-clinches-world-challenge-in-playoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/matsuyama-clinches-world-challenge-in-playoff\/","title":{"rendered":"Matsuyama clinches World Challenge in playoff"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Hideki Matsuyama hit a birdie in the first playoff hole to defeat Alex Noren and claim the World Challenge gold championships at the Albany Golf Club in Bahamas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Matsuyama, holed out from 116 yards in the 10th fairway for eagle that allowed him to catch Sepp Straka and move past two-time defending champion Scottie Scheffler and seize control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Noren, meanwhile, caught Matsuyama with an 18-foot birdie putt on the final hole to force the playoff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Both golfers were tied on 266 after hitting identical 8-under-64 in the final round.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignright size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"750\" src=\"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/500px-Hideki_Matsuyama_ClevelandGolf4-21_cropped.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6934\" style=\"width:319px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/500px-Hideki_Matsuyama_ClevelandGolf4-21_cropped.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/500px-Hideki_Matsuyama_ClevelandGolf4-21_cropped-200x300.jpg 200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>HIdeki Matsuyama (Photo by Srixon\/Cleveland Golf) <\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>With Matsuyama birdieing the hole, Noren&#8217;s 20-foot birdie attempt slid by on the left.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was Matsuyama\u2019s second win at the event hosted by Tiger Woods having also clinched the title in 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Straka, the 54-hole leader by one shot over Scheffler, birdied the final hole for a 68 to finish alone in third. Scheffler had a slow start and a two-hole stretch early on the back nine that ruined his bid for a third straight victory. He shot 68 and tied for fourth with U.S. Open champion J.J. Spaun 65).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Scheffler ended his season by not finishing worse than a tie for eighth in his last 16 events dating to the Houston Open the last week in March.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Europe win World Champions Cup<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Meanwhile, Team Europe scored 102.5 points to run away with the Skechers World Champions Cup supporting Shriners Children&#8217;s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They won by 16.5 points over the runner-up Team International after entering the final day with a narrow 1.5-point lead,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Team USA\u2019s Jason Caron was the leading point scorer for the event with 60.5 points, scoring double-digit points in each of the last four sessions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The unique event is being played for a second time featured three teams \u2013 the U.S., Europe and an International squad \u2013 facing off in a six-somes, six-balls and singles in a blend of Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup events. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hideki Matsuyama hit a birdie in the first playoff hole to defeat Alex Noren and claim the World<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[58],"class_list":["post-6933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-golf"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-scaled.jpg",2560,1440,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-300x169.jpg",300,169,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-768x432.jpg",640,360,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-1024x576.jpg",640,360,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-1536x864.jpg",1536,864,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-2048x1152.jpg",2048,1152,true],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-825x575.jpg",825,575,true],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-590x410.jpg",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/category\/international\/\" rel=\"category tag\">International<\/a>","tag_info":"International","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/hero-world-challenge-round-3-07-desember-2025-06e802-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6933"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6938,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6933\/revisions\/6938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}