{"id":324281,"date":"2026-03-02T01:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T01:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/324281\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T01:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T01:43:09","slug":"shane-lowry-suffers-nightmare-collapse-over-closing-holes-at-cognizant-classic-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/324281\/","title":{"rendered":"Shane Lowry suffers nightmare collapse over closing holes at Cognizant Classic \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shane Lowry<\/a> was mauled by the Bear Trap at PGA National in the final round of the Cognizant Classic as his bid for a fourth career win on the PGA Tour<\/a> fell apart.<\/p>\n

Three strokes clear standing on the 16th tee and seemingly in cruise control, Lowry found water on both the 16th and 17th holes to ultimately come up short, as Colombia\u2019s Nico Echavarria took advantage of the Irish man\u2019s woes to take the $1.7 million payday.<\/p>\n

Lowry \u2013 seeking a first win on the US circuit since teaming up with Rory McIlroy<\/a> in lifting the Zurich Classic in 2024 \u2013 had the prize within his grasp after a brilliant 15 holes only for it to slip away with uncharacteristic sloppiness over the closing holes – that stretch from 15th to 17th, known as the Bear Trap in honour of course designer Jack Nicklaus – proving his downfall.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m obviously extremely disappointed,\u201d said Lowry. \u201cI had the tournament in my hands, and I threw it away. What more can I say? That\u2019s twice this year now so far. I\u2019m getting good at it.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, look, what can I say? I played unbelievable all day, and one bad shot on 16 completely threw me for the last three holes. It\u2019s never happened to me before.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said to Darren [Reynolds, his caddie], how do I feel like this now when I went through what I did last September in Bethpage [at the Ryder Cup] and got through that fine. I just felt like it was weird out there; I just couldn\u2019t feel the club face the last three holes after my tee shot on 16. It was strange.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat can I say? It\u2019s very disappointing. Geez, this is going to be hard to take. Dubai was hard at the start of the year, but this is going to be pretty hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the first 15 holes, Lowry had claimed four birdies and an eagle, on the 10th, to open up a three stroke lead on Echavarria. But a double-bogey six on the 16th and a double-bogey five on the 17th provided a disastrous half hour of golf for the Offaly man.<\/p>\n

From skipping along the fairways with barely a care in the world, Lowry finished with shoulders slumped in settling for joint runner-up after a closing round of 69. Echavarria shot a bogey free closing round 66 for a total of 17-under-par 267, his birdie on the Par 3 17th proving critical as Lowry\u2019s travails behind were unfolding.<\/p>\n

\"NicoNico Echavarria of Colombia celebrates after a birdie putt on the 17th green during the final round of the Cognizant Classic in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. Photograph: Mike Ehrmann\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Lowry needed an eagle on the Par 5 18th to force a playoff, hitting his approach into a green side bunker. He needed to hole out to force extra time, but his aggressive shot ran by and beyond the hole. Lowry signed for a 69 for a 269 total, in a three-way tie with Austin Smotherman and Taylor Moore for second.<\/p>\n

The hurt on Lowry\u2019s face as he walked up to mark his ball told the whole story, of another one that had gotten away.<\/p>\n

Lowry will have little time to heal his mental wounds, moving on to this week\u2019s Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill followed by a fifth straight week on the road in The Players.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shane Lowry was mauled by the Bear Trap at PGA National in the final round of the Cognizant…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":324282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,91189,1394,1395,112],"class_list":["post-324281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-pga-tour","tag-rory-mcilroy","tag-shane-lowry","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/324282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}