J.J. Spaun didn’t just win the U.S. Open — he survived it. In doing so, he turned a day that started in disaster and ended in downpours into one of the most improbable and poetic triumphs in major championship history.
Spaun’s final-round 72 at Oakmont was anything but smooth. After starting just one stroke off the lead, he quickly spiraled with bogeys on five of his first six holes.
His early collapse was punctuated by a nearly perfect approach at the 2nd hole that clipped the flagstick and somehow kicked off the green — the kind of cruel twist that would mentally undo most players. At that point, Spaun looked cooked, another storyline washed away by bigger names like Viktor Hovland, Sam Burns, and Adam Scott.
But then came the rain.
From Meltdown to Momentum
Spaun found clarity amid chaos as the skies opened and play was halted. Grounds crews scrambled to soak up puddles with towels and squeegees while Spaun re-centered. He used the delay not to dwell on his disastrous front nine but to reset — mentally, physically, emotionally.
“That break was actually the key for me to winning this tournament,” Spaun later said. His caddie, Mark Carens, called it “a good break.” That’s putting it lightly.
Once play resumed, Spaun morphed from afterthought to assassin. He clawed back with crucial birdies — none bigger than the bomb on 12, then another on 14 — to claw his way to even par. And just when it looked like the day was headed toward a Monday playoff with Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre sitting at 1-over in the clubhouse, Spaun delivered the moment of the tournament.
The Longest Putt — and the Biggest Win
From 64 feet and 5 inches away on the 18th green — in rising rain, with the gallery breathless and a playoff looming — Spaun buried a birdie putt that no one saw coming. Not the announcers. Not Hovland, who watched it fall in from just off the green. And not even Spaun, who had been doing everything just to keep pace.
“That was unbelievable,” Hovland said. “It just looked like he was out of it immediately… but to watch him hole the one on 12, and then 14, and then that on 18 — it’s just filthy.”
Spaun became just the fifth player ever to finish birdie-birdie to win the U.S. Open, joining a club that includes Jon Rahm and Tiger Woods. His final score of 279 (1-under) made him the only player in red numbers all week. And that putt? It was the longest made by any player all tournament.
From Job Insecurity to Job Security
This wasn’t just a win. It was a career shift. Spaun hadn’t won since the 2022 Valero Texas Open, and he admitted he spent last summer worrying he might lose his PGA Tour card altogether. But things had started to click again — a playoff loss to Rory McIlroy at the Players Championship, a top-10 at the Truist, and a bogey-free 66 in the U.S. Open’s first round.
Now, Spaun has a five-year PGA Tour exemption, five-year invitations to every major, and a 10-year ticket to future U.S. Opens. He’s no longer grinding for status. He’s solidified. And in the process, he gave his family — and himself — a moment they’ll never forget.
His wife, Melody, said it best: “Just knowing what’s coming is amazing and exciting and scary at the same time. But in a good way.”
“You Just Stay There”
The final words of Spaun’s story are the most fitting. He recalled advice he once heard via Max Homa, who relayed a lesson from Tiger Woods: You don’t need to be a hero at a U.S. Open. You just have to stay there.
Spaun did more than stay there. He hung on when it all went wrong. He calmed the chaos when the storm arrived. And in the end, he owned the moment when it mattered most.
He wasn’t supposed to win this tournament a week ago, but by Sunday evening, he had made PGA Tour history. That’s golf. That’s grit. That’s J.J. Spaun — U.S. Open champion.
