Greg Norman won for the first time on the tour in more than a year, shooting a 6-under-par 66 Sunday and capturing the Memorial by four strokes on a water-logged course.
In winning this tournament for a second time, Norman made a critical save of par on the 12th hole and finished with a total of 19-under 269."Today," tournament host and founder Jack Nicklaus said, "I saw a man who wanted to win a golf tournament. Two guys threw 67s at him and another 68, and he just played better."
Norman is recovering from back spasms and this was his first tournament in six weeks.
The Muirfield Village Golf Club course was a soggy mess Sunday, with players allowed to lift, clean and place balls in the fairway.
For the long day, Norman scored seven birdies and no bogeys in 22 holes. He was among the 22 players stranded on the course by darkness Saturday night and had to return early in the morning to complete his round.
He birdied the first hole he played, finished that round with a 67 and had a one-shot lead.
And he never relinquished it. But the margin of victory does not indicate how close the race became, nor how important his deft, delicate shot from deep, wet rough on the 12th may have been.
Norman's lead was but a single shot and he was under pressure from Mark Calcavecchia, Steve Elkington and rookie David Duval when he hit his tee shot a little left and over the green on the par-3 12th.
The ball was well above the green, in a hanging lie, on the short side of the green and in almost the same position from which, minutes earlier, Vijay Singh had hit into the pond fronting the green.
"If you drop it short, in the deep rough, it won't come out," Norman recalled. "If you drop it on the green, it will skip across" and find the water.
It was exactly the sort of Sunday back-nine trouble that has marked much of his star-crossed career.
Was another one about to slip away?
Norman answered by dropping the shot into the fringe and watched in joy as it ran to the cup, spun out of the hole and stopped inches away.
"I hit it perfect," Norman said. "No question about it, that was the most important shot."
He finished with a string of five consecutive one-putts - saves on the 15th and 16th, birdies on the 14th, 17th and 18th.
Calcavecchia, one of three tied for second at 273, agreed.
"I had a chance to win the golf tournament and I didn't," he said. "When Greg gets like that he's pretty hard to handle."
Calcavecchia had one of those 67s and was tied with Elkington, who had the other, and rookie David Duval, who recorded his third runner-up finish of the season with a 68.
It was two strokes back to the group tied at 275 - Tom Watson, Ben Crenshaw, Jay Haas, David Frost and Robert Gamez.
Haas, who played the last 36 holes in 131, had a closing 65. Crenshaw and Watson each shot 69, while Frost had a 70 and Gamez 71.
Norman scored his first official victory since his runaway triumph in the Players' Championship last year.
His 13th American tour triumph was worth $306,000 from the purse of $1.7 million and lifted his season's earnings to $626,400.
At Birmingham, Ala., Graham Marsh had a 2-under-par 70 Sunday in an overpowering five-shot victory in the Bruno's Memorial Classic for his first victory on the Senior PGA Tour and his second win ever in the United States.
The native of Australia finished with a 15-under 201 total, the lowest for 54 holes on tour this year, and matched the largest margin of victory in taking the $157,500 first prize.
J.C. Snead finished strong, grabbing second with a 68 for a 206.
Marsh won his only other American tournament in 1977, choosing to spend most of his time closer to home for family considerations. He had 24 triumphs in Japan, 16 in his native country and 15 on the European tour.
Tom Weiskopf finished tied with Larry Laoretti and Bud Allin, who both had a final-round 70, and Bruce Summerhays, who matched Weiskopf's 71.
At East Lansing, Mich., Dale Eggeling shot a 1-under-par 71 Sunday to win the Oldsmobile Classic, earning more from this one tournament than she has in 15 of her 19 years on the LPGA Tour.
Eggeling, who led all three rounds after opening with a 63 Thursday, won for the first time in 15 years and took home $90,000.
She finished at 14-under 274 at Walnut Hills Country Club, two strokes ahead of Meg Mallon, Elaine Crosby and Annika Sorenstam of Sweden.