Players Championship: Karl Vilips' late birdie spree in Puerto Rico earns last Players spot

Yahoo

11-03-2025

Karl Vilips waited until the last possible moment to snare the last possible spot in The Players Championship.
Vilips, a Stanford University graduate, native of Indonesia and a current Jacksonville resident by way of Perth, Australia, won the Puerto Rico Open on Sunday with a final-round 64 at the Grand Reserve Golf Club in Rio Grande, P.R.
At 26-under-par 262, Vilips beat Rasum Neergaard-Peterson by three shots and earned a ticket to the Players Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass, where will make only his fifth PGA Tour start.
Vilps birdied four of his last six holes and earned a first-place check of $720,000 in the event opposite the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He also picked up 300 FedEx Cup points and moved to 41st on the current standings.
Vilips is also in the 2025 PGA May 12-15 at the Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte and has a two-year exemption onto the PGA Tour.
'Trying to soak it all in at the moment ... just thinking ahead to next week already, Players, I'm getting ready for it,' Vilips said during his post-round news conference. 'That was the big goal I wanted to get into The Players and I knew I had to win this week to do it. It's just a dream come true to be able to play in that tournament."
Vilips, who moved to Jacksonville in November of 2025, said thinking about the perks of winning kept him awake Saturday night.
'That was about the only thing on my mind ... everything that comes with a victory here,' he said. 'I had a hard time getting to sleep. But on the course it was just staying in the present, doing what I can do and I think I did a really good job of that because it is tough to not think about everything. Once I hit that wedge close on 18, those thoughts definitely started flowing in my head.'
Ironically, Vilips knocked former Jacksonville resident Bud Cauley out of the Players field. Cauley was the last player to qualify based on the 2025 FedEx Cup points list but winning a Tour event carries a higher priority and Cauley moved to first alternate
The good news for Cauley is that he was back in The Players field 12 hour later. Lee Hodges withdrew early Monday because of a rib injury and Cauley replaced him.
Vilips became the 12th player since 1970 to win a PGA Tour event on his fourth start or less, a list that includes Arnold Palmer Invitational winner Russell Henley, World Golf Hall of Fame member Seve Ballesteros, and 1999 British Open champion Paul Lawrie. Vilips first start was as an amateur when he qualified for the 2023 U.S. Open.
Vilips also is another success story from PGA Tour University, which maintains a ranking system of results in college events, and Tour and Korn Ferry tournaments where college players get exemptions. He was 10th on last year's PGA Tour U standings, which earned him conditional Korn Ferry status.
He made the most of it. Vilips had seven top-25 finishes in 10 starts, and won the Utah Championship, a week after finishing solo second in the NV5 Invitational. He finished 19th on the final Korn Ferry points list, earning his PGA Tour card for 2025.
Vilips was unable to get a start until the Mexico Open. He tied for 72nd, then made the field for the Cognizant Open, and tied for 39th.
Vilips, fifth all-time on the Stanford career scoring average list, became the seventh international winner in nine Tour events this season. He was a three-time All-Pac 12 player and won the 2024 Pac 12 Championship.
Vilips should be familiar with the Stadium Course, albeit under far different circumstances than The Players. He had five starts in the Junior Players, which is held on Labor Day Weekend. But he finished among the top 10 each year and improved from year-to-year. He tied for ninth in 2016 when he was 14 years old, tied for eighth in 2017, was solo sixth in 2018, solo third in 2019 and tied for second in 2020.
'I'm just excited to sleep in my own bed, cook my own meals, be with my roommates. It's going to be a lot of fun,' he said. 'Never really had a chance to do a home tournament. Obviously just moving there in November, I played a course a bunch. It's been looking really good. Last time I played it was three weeks ago so I'm sure by now it's in pristine shape and I'm really excited."
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Karl Vilips earned last Players Championship spot with Puerto Rico victory