TORONTO, ON — Nick Taylor tossed his putter into the air and jumped into the arms of caddie Dave Markle after he made a 72-foot eagle putt to become the first Canadian in 69 years to win his national open, and he doesn't remember any of it.
“I blacked out when that ball went in with Dave. So I'm curious to watch that, what we did,” Taylor said.
Few who witnessed it will ever forget.
Taylor delivered a signature moment in Canadian sports when his uphill, left-to-right-breaking putt — the longest made putt of his PGA Tour career — hit the flagstick and dropped on the fourth hole of a playoff against Tommy Fleetwood for the RBC Canadian Open title.
“It’s a tournament that we’ve circled on our calendar since probably junior golf,” Taylor said. “To kind of break that curse, if you want to call it, is — I’m pretty speechless. I don’t think it’s going to sink in for quite some time what happened today.”
Fellow Canadian players Mike Weir, Corey Conners and Adam Hadwin were among those who ran onto the green to congratulate him. Hadwin, Taylor's close friend, was tackled by a security guard while spraying champagne from a bottle.
Fans swarmed toward the green, and Hadwin — who like Taylor grew up in Abbotsford, British Columbia — got leveled amid the chaos. He said had so much adrenaline that the tackle didn't faze him.
“It’s incredible. I mean, what do you say to one of the greatest moments of Canadian golf history?” Hadwin said. “I think we all predicted that this was going to happen.
“I’m not sure that any one of us predicted a 72-foot eagle putt ... to get it done, but what a way to go.”
Hadwin's wife later tweeted that her husband "in true Canadian form, apologized to the security guard for being tackled."
