2004 PGA Championship Winner and Scores

The 2004 PGA Championship was the 86th time the tournament was played, and required a playoff to settle. A brand new playoff format for this major was used, and the tournament featured a prominent debut for a golf course.

Winner: Vijay Singh, 280

Where it was played: Whistling Straits, Kohler, Wisconsin

Tournament dates: August 12-15, 2004

Leader after first round: Darren Clarke, 65

Leader after second round: Justin Leonard and Vijay Singh, 135

Leader after third round: Vijay Singh, 204

What Happened at the 2004 PGA Championship

This tournament was the international "coming out" for Whistling Straits, a Pete Dye-designed golf course on the shores of Lake Michigan. Dye built a rugged, shaggy, windswept course in the links tradition and presented golfers with many unusual sitelines around the course. It was also the longest (7,536 yards) course in major championship history to this point. Early predictions of extravagantly high scores did not bear out. But Whistling Straits went on to become a go-to course for the PGA of America.

Something else new in the 2004 PGA Championship: the playoff format. The sudden-death format was last used in the 2000 PGA Championship, after which the PGA switched to a three-hole, aggregate score format. That format was needed for the first time here after Vijay Singh, Chris DiMarco and Justin Leonard all tied at 8-under 280.

Singh carded a 76 in the final round, plagued by a balky putter. He didn't make a birdie in the entire fourth round. Yet, he walked off with the Wanamaker Trophy for the second time.

Justin Leonard appeared to have one hand on the trophy when he took a 2-stroke lead with five holes to play. But Leonard couldn't make any putts down the stretch either, and a late bogey dropped him into the three-way tie with Singh and DiMarco. DiMarco shot 71 in the final round, but started the last day five strokes behind Singh's lead.

That threesome continued with the three-hole, aggregate score playoff. And Singh, despite his troubles throughout the day, was the only one of the three to make anything happen. Singh nearly drove the green on the first extra hole, a par-4, then sank a 6-foot birdie putt. So while Singh failed to make a birdie in the fourth round, he made one when it counted even more — in the playoff. It was the only birdie made by any of the three golfers in the playoff.

For Singh, it was his third career major championship victory. His final-round 76 set a record for highest final-round score by a PGA Championship winner, and was the highest final round of any major championship winner since Reg Whitcombe shot 78 in Round 4 at the 1938 British Open. But he made the putt that counted the most. At 41 years old, he was, at the time, the fourth-oldest winner of a PGA Championship.

Nick Faldo, who won six major championships but never the PGA, played this major for the final time this year, tying for 49th.

2004 PGA Championship Final Scores

Vijay Singh 67-68-69-76—280 (3-3-4—10)
Chris DiMarco 68-70-71-71—280 (4-3-x—x)
Justin Leonard 66-69-70-75—280 (4-3-x—x)
Chris Riley 69-70-69-73—281
Ernie Els 66-70-72-73—281
K.J. Choi 68-71-73-70—282
Paul McGinley 69-74-70-69—282
Phil Mickelson 69-72-67-74—282
Ben Crane 70-74-69-70—283
Robert Allenby 71-70-72-70—283
Stephen Ames 68-71-69-75—283
Adam Scott 71-71-69-72—283
Brian Davis 70-71-69-74—284
Darren Clarke 65-71-72-76—284
Arron Oberholser 73-71-70-70—284
Brad Faxon 71-71-70-72—284
Loren Roberts 68-72-70-75—285
Jean-Francois Remesy 72-71-70-72—285
Matt Gogel 71-71-69-74—285
Fredrik Jacobson 72-70-70-73—285
Stewart Cink 73-70-70-72—285
Stuart Appleby 68-75-72-70—285
David Toms 72-72-69-72—285
Tiger Woods 75-69-69-73—286
J.L. Lewis 73-69-72-72—286
Tom Byrum 72-73-71-70—286
Chad Campbell 73-70-71-72—286
Luke Donald 67-73-71-75—286
Geoff Ogilvy 68-73-71-74—286
Shaun Micheel 77-68-70-71—286
Nick O'Hern 73-71-68-75—287
Charles Howell III 70-71-72-74—287
Miguel Angel Jimenez 76-65-75-71—287
Carlos Franco 69-75-72-71—287
Bo Van Pelt 74-71-70-72—287
Chip Sullivan 72-71-73-71—287
Briny Baird 67-69-75-77—288
Jay Haas 68-72-71-77—288
Todd Hamilton 72-73-75-68—288
Zach Johnson 75-70-69-74—288
Trevor Immelman 75-69-72-72—288
Brett Quigley 74-69-73-72—288
Ian Poulter 73-72-70-73—288
Steve Flesch 73-72-67-76—288
Niclas Fasth 74-70-73-72—289
David Howell 72-72-70-75—289
Padraig Harrington 68-71-72-78—289
Tommy Armour 72-71-74-72—289
Michael Campbell 71-73-69-77—290
Patrick Sheehan 70-71-75-74—290
Duffy Waldorf 69-72-70-79—290
Nick Faldo 72-70-74-74—290
Joe Ogilvie 75-68-70-77—290
Carl Pettersson 71-71-76-73—291
Rod Pampling 73-69-70-80—292
Eduardo Romero 72-73-70-77—292
Craig Parry 70-75-71-76—292
Bob Tway 71-70-74-77—292
S.K. Ho 72-73-73-74—292
Hidemichi Tanaka 72-71-71-78—292
Paul Azinger 74-71-74-73—292
Woody Austin 74-71-74-74—293
Jeff Sluman 72-72-79-70—293
Scott Verplank 67-76-77-73—293
Shingo Katayama 74-70-76-73—293
Bernhard Langer 74-70-75-75—294
Scott Drummond 71-72-76-75—294
Mark Hensby 74-69-77-76—296
Robert Gamez 72-73-76-75—296
Colin Montgomerie 73-72-78-74—297
Roy Biancalana 73-72-75-79—299
Jeff Coston 77-68-79-77—301
Skip Kendall 72-73-79-80—304

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