ROCHESTER, N.Y. -- Shaun Micheel didn't set too high a goal for himself in the PGA Championship. Four good rounds and one spectacular shot later he made golf history.
The 34-year-old player who hadn't done much to distinguish himself in eight seasons on the PGA Tour became the latest first-time winner of a major championship on Sunday.
"I really can't believe what happened to me," he said after his two-shot victory over Chad Campbell at Oak Hill Country Club.
"I showed up here on Tuesday to play a practice round and saw how difficult this course was and I was just trying to make the cut. I know that sounds pretty simple, but really, that was my main goal, and I probably would have been happy with that," he said.
His first tour victory in his first PGA Championship appearance capped by the shot of a lifetime sets him up for a blast of delirious joy.
Micheel became the fourth first-time winner of a major this year, the first time that has happened since 1969, the year he was born. Micheel is the 13th of the last 16 PGA champions to make this event their first major win. He is the seventh player to take the Wanamaker Trophy in his first PGA appearance and the seventh player to make the PGA his first tour title.
He's pretty much alone in closing one out in such style.
Micheel bogeyed No. 17 to let Campbell, his co-leader at the start of the final round, within one stroke. Micheel hit first after the drives and his 7-iron from 175 yards in the first cut of rough stopped two inches from the cup.
When Campbell's shot didn't go in -- it landed about 20 feet from the cup -- Micheel had a tap-in for an even-par 70 and 4-under 276 total.
"I didn't know how close his was," said Campbell, whose 72 left him one stroke in front of South Africa's Tim Clark. "That was probably the best shot I've ever seen under the pressure."
It is now one of the shots that will be shown over and over for years and years.
"I don't recall too many great shots that won tournaments on the 18th hole," Micheel said. "I'm not a great historian on golf, I apologize, but I just can't think of too many right now."
Micheel didn't know how close it was because he couldn't see the elevated green from the fairway.
"It was an absolutely perfect, perfect number and I knew it was pretty close," Micheel said. "I saw it was two inches I figured I could make that one."
He did.
"I was trying to win the B.C. Open a year ago this time," said Micheel, who won $1.08 million with his first win in his 164th tour start. "A month or two ago, I was trying to keep my card. To have my name on that trophy, I don't know what I'm thinking right now."
Campbell, who was down three strokes with four holes to play, could have replaced Micheel in every aspect of being a first-timer except this was his second PGA. The second prize of $648,000 lifted him into ninth place on this year's money list with $2.5 million.
"It is very difficult to get yourself in the position of the last group of a major championship and I have to take the positive of the way I played coming down the stretch and use that the next time I get in this position and hopefully that will be soon," said Campbell, whose 65 on Saturday was the low round of the tournament.
Clark, tied for the lead as he made the turn, made four bogeys on the back nine and had to settle for a 69.
Alex Cejka had a 69 and was at even-par 280.
Tiger Woods closed with a 73 to finish at 12-over 292, extending his streak of failing to win a major to six. This was the first year he failed to win at least one major since 1998.
This was the year of the first-timers with Mike Weir winning the Masters, Jim Furyk the U.S. Open and Ben Curtis the British Open. This was Micheel's week.
"I look down that list right there and see all the names," he said, referring to past PGA champions. "I just hope that maybe I can produce a career like a lot of those guys."
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