Collin Morikawa just won his first PGA Tour event since 2023, and what a place to do it.
The American claimed his seventh win on the PGA Tour at the iconic Pebble Beach, and showed steely composure to do so. He needed a birdie or better to win it on the 18th hole, and shot a four on the par-five 18th hole.
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The 18th saw its fair share of birdies and eagles on the final day, but you’d do well to find a more difficult circumstance for Morikawa to play his approach. He had over 200 yards to the green, wind hurtling in from the left, and he had an agonizing wait before he hit the shot.
He had to wait over 20 minutes for the green to clear as Jacob Bridgeman hit his approach onto the beach, then into the water. And he was faced with an extreme mental battle before stepping up to the ball.
Photo by Matthew Huang/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
What Collin Morikawa did to calm his mind while waiting to hit winning shot at Pebble Beach
Morikawa showed incredible resolve to keep his composure and hit what proved to be the tournament-winning shot, which settled just right of the green. Speaking afterwards to Dan Rapaport, Morikawa explained how he used the legendary setting to calm himself.
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He said, “Honestly, I just stared at the ocean. Like that’s why I kept pacing back and forth. Like, I don’t know how many times they showed me pacing back and forth. But that’s all I did.
“The last thing I wanted to do was think about how I was going to hit that shot, because if I started thinking about it, you know, ‘Okay man, I have 220 to the front, 236 to the hole. Oh I got to start it this far in here. Oh I saw Jacob hit his shot left. Do I need to start it more left or more right?’
“It was the last thing, for me, being an LA guy, being a West Coast guy like you, you look at the ocean, and I think you forget about everything else in life. That helped so much. I was very, very lucky to have that backdrop, and just stared at some rocks.
“Stared at some water, stared at some birds. Just anything aside from hitting that shot.”
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For some, the fact that this was taking place at Pebble Beach, one of the most legendary golf courses on the planet, might have overwhelmed them. But for LA-born Morikawa, this is home. This is the ocean he grew up staring at, so it helped to settle him, and he hit one of the shots of his life.
Collin Morikawa credits sports psychologist after win at Pebble Beach
Morikawa’s win came out of seemingly nowhere. He missed the cut at the Sony Open, his first start of 2026, then finished T54 at the WM Phoenix Open.
But he was able to put that all behind him and win at Pebble Beach, and he laid some of the credit at the feet of his sports psychologist, Rick Sessinghaus, who he spoke to at length during the week.
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Speaking after the win, Morikawa said about his game: “You know, honestly, the last two days it felt really good.
“I went into this year feeling really good about myself. You go out and play two rounds at Sony and I missed the cut and you realize, man, do I need to redo everything that you thought you were doing for the last two months?
“That’s not really the case. The problem is the results matter sometimes and for me in this world after the past, you know, a year, three years, whatever you want to call it, I just haven’t had the results I’ve wanted. But I know I’m making the right strides, I know I’m inching towards the right direction.
“It’s just I just haven’t seen this momentum to be able to go out and play a low round. If you went back and was able to tap into my phone calls with Rick the past week and a half, a lot of it has had to do with being able to go low and just being able to continue momentum.
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“It’s very hard to replicate, it’s very hard to do, but at the same time you’ve got to be able to play golf out here.”
Whatever Sessinghaus said during the week, it clearly worked on the 18th hole.
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