NBA PLAYOFFS

The Warriors find some

separation late, take a 3-0

lead on the Mavericks. D5

BASEBALL

Stephen Strasburg has

a rehab start Tuesday, and

the Nationals get a win. D3

KLMNO

SPORTS

MONDAY, MAY 23 , 2022. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/SPORTS M2 D

PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

Southern Hills, final

TO PAR

1Justin Thomas* -5

2Will Zalatoris -5

T3 Cameron Young -4

T3 Mito Pereira -4

T5 Tommy Fleetwood -3

T5 Chris Kirk -3

T5 Matt Fitzpatrick -3

8Rory McIlroy -2

* won in three-hole playoff

Inside: Mito Pereira had the title in

his grasp. Then: the 18th hole. D2

BY CHUCK CULPEPPER

tulsa — It seemed clear by midafternoon Sunday

that the 104th PGA Championship would go to one

of four young guys you probably wouldn’t recog-

nize if they showed up at your front door, trying to

sell you a vacuum cleaner.

How odd, then, that the gap between those four

and the rest would erode when the familiar face of

Justin Thomas came galloping out of the leader

board yonder. How odd that Thomas, a player

many golf intellectuals thought would win here,

would win here in a three-hole playoff over Will

Zalatoris long after those same geeks must have

concluded he wouldn’t, long after an early-round

deficit of a hopeless eight shots. And how oddest

that, along the way, one of those four little-known

youths, Mito Pereira of Chile, would stagger from a

three-shot lead into both a creek and the haunted

halls of golf lore.

At some points, Thomas must have assumed he

wasn’t winning.

“For sure,” he said.

How odd.

“I wasn’t looking at leader boards today,” he said.

“I was just trying to play golf.”

No wonder that when he plunked in his clinch-

ing 14-inch par putt at No. 18 in the playoff, he sort

of laughed.

When the geeks sit around years from now and

yak about a daydream Sunday with soft clouds

yielding to sunshine at Southern Hills, they might

not remember how Thomas played the last 12 holes

of Round 4 in 4 under par — four birdies, eight pars

— to reach 5 under and the cusp of the lead, how his

67 made him the lone player in the last seven

groups to break par. They might not remember how

the face of the 29-year-old took on a look of

charismatic certainty as he began the flawless

playoff of birdie-birdie-par that would bring him a

second major and a second PGA title. They might

SEE PGA ON D2

Reversal of fortunes

Pereira collapses on 18th hole, and Thomas erases eight-shot deficit before winning PGA in playoff

ERIC GAY/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Justin Thomas embraces the Wanamaker Trophy on Sunday after he won the PGA Championship in a playoff against Will Zalatoris at Southern Hills in Tulsa.

When Roger
Angell was in his
80s, I was proud
to be his human
shield in a spitball
assault in which
Roger pummeled
a pompous pundit
with paper wads
in a Yankee Stadium press box.
“Lean forward just a little so I
can throw behind you. I think I
can hit him in the head,” said
Angell, the best baseball essayist
ever, who died Friday at 101.
Roger’s target was a famous
but obnoxious TV know-it-all —
on both sports and politics —
who was standing in the
auxiliary press box aisle making
loud comments to a pair of
sycophants on all subjects,
except the playoff game in
progress.
“Pipe down!” Angell said in a
fake voice, firing his salvo, then
falling back behind me — seated
face forward, just watching the
game, the image of aged
innocent itself. Who could be
suspicious of such an elderly
literary legend — the fiction
editor at the New Yorker to John
Updike and Ann Beattie and the
stepson of author E.B. White?
Hidden in plain sight was a
third-grade saboteur on a
mission.
“Missed,” Angell hissed. “Let’s
try it again.”
SEE BOSWELL ON D3

For Angell,

life was a ball,

and so was

his writing

Thomas
Boswell

Dream at Mystics

Tomorrow, 7 p.m., NBCSW

boston — If they
haven’t already, all
of the players
participating in
this Eastern
Conference finals
should sign a
waiver. The series
involving the top-
seeded Miami Heat, the second-
seeded Boston Celtics and their
top-notch training staffs isn’t for
anyone who believes basketball
consists merely of beauty or
grace.
No. Basketball, at least in this
series, is a “Survivor” reboot. An
every-man, every-knee-for-
himself round of attrition. The
team left standing — or, better
yet, limping out of the arena —
with the most body parts intact
wins.
Heat forward Jimmy Butler
couldn’t play in the second half of
Game 3 because of inflammation
in his knee. Marcus Smart, the
SEE BUCKNER ON D5

Celtics, Heat

transforming

injuries into

an art form

Candace
Buckner

BY KAREEM COPELAND

The star power and champion-

ship experience at Entertain-

ment and Sports Arena on Sun-

day afternoon were impressive

during a nationally televised

showdown featuring the winners

of two of the past three WNBA

titles. The Chicago Sky arrived as

the defending champ, and the

Washington Mystics still have

several major pieces from their

2019 title team.

There was a two-time MVP on

both sides: Elena Delle Donne

and Candace Parker. The Sky has

a pair of WNBA Finals MVPs in

Kahleah Copper and Emma

Meesseman; Copper was traded

from Washington to Chicago in a

deal for Delle Donne in 2017, and

Meesseman was the Finals MVP

for the Mystics two years later.

As the loaded rosters met for

SEE MYSTICS ON D5

Washington stumbles in a showdown full of stars

SKY 82,

MYSTICS 73

KATHERINE FREY/THE WASHINGTON POST

Elena Delle Donne and Candace Parker battled Sunday in a matchup of two-time WNBA MVPs.

NCAA men’s lacrosse semifinal:

Maryland vs. Princeton

In East Hartford, Conn.

Saturday, 2:30 p.m., ESPN2

DeMaio said. “There’s one big cel-

ebration, and we’re not there yet,

and I think we all know what the

job is and we have to finish that

job.”

Owen Murphy scored four

goals, DeMaio and Logan Wis-

nauskas had three goals and two

assists apiece and Logan Mc-

Naney matched a season high

with 14 saves for the Terps (16-0),

who will meet fifth-seeded Prince-

ton (11-4) in Saturday’s NCAA

semifinals in East Hartford, Conn.

Maryland has won 33 of its past

34 games. The lone loss in that

span was a 17-16 setback to Vir-

ginia in the 2021 national title

SEE MARYLAND ON D6

BY PATRICK STEVENS

If there’s standard operating
procedure for teams in the NCAA
men’s lacrosse tournament, it’s
that a quarterfinal victory is wor-
thy of a raucous celebration in
acknowledgment of reaching the
season’s final weekend.
But then there are teams such
as top-seeded Maryland, which
took a more muted, businesslike
approach after doubling up de-
fending national champion Vir-
ginia, 18-9, on Sunday in Colum-
bus, Ohio.
“I think we all have an end goal
in mind here, and we’re taking it
day by day,” midfielder Anthony

In perfect fashion, Terps top

Cavaliers to reach Final Four

MARYLAND 18,

VIRGINIA 9

Eastern Conference finals
Game 4: Heat at Celtics
Today, 8:30 p.m., ABC