Early years

Kuchar was born in Winter Park, Florida, to a Ukrainian family. He went on to graduate from Seminole High School in Sanford in 1996. Later he attended Georgia Tech in Atlanta, where he was a two-time first-team All-American on the Yellow Jackets' golf team. After narrowly losing in the semi-finals of the 1996 U.S. Amateur championship to Tiger Woods, Kuchar won the title in 1997 (his final amateur event before turning pro). He received the Haskins Award in 1998 as the nation's top collegiate golfer, and was the low amateur at both The Masters and U.S. Open. He turned pro in 2000 after earning his bachelor's degree in management. One of Kuchar's teammates at Georgia Tech was future PGA Tour professional Bryce Molder.

Professional career

Early career

Kuchar turned professional in November 2000, after working briefly for a financial services firm. He missed the sign-up deadline for the 2000 qualifying school. In 2001 he was given sponsors' exemptions to some PGA tournaments, and earned enough money to be fully exempt for the 2002 season.

Kuchar's first win on the PGA Tour came at the Honda Classic in 2002. A tough year in 2005 saw him win under $403,000, 159th on the money list, which caused a loss of his tour card. He failed to regain it at qualifying school and played on the Nationwide Tour in 2006. Kuchar won its Henrico County Open and finished tenth on the Nationwide Tour money list to earn back his PGA Tour card for 2007. He retained his card for the next two seasons by finishing 115th on the money list in 2007 and 70th in 2008.

2009

Seven years after his first PGA Tour win, Kuchar won for a second time during the Fall Series in 2009 at the Turning Stone Resort Championship. He prevailed in a playoff over Vaughn Taylor that concluded on Monday due to darkness on Sunday evening.

2010

Kuchar made the Ryder Cup team in 2010, taking the eighth and last merit position on the 12-man U.S. squad on August 15. At the time, Kuchar led the PGA Tour in top-10 finishes for the year, but had not won a tournament in 2010. The winless streak ended two weeks later at The Barclays on August 29, which was played at the Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus, New Jersey; Kuchar defeated Martin Laird on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff.

Kuchar won the Vardon Trophy and Byron Nelson Award in 2010 for lowest scoring average and the PGA Tour's Arnold Palmer Award for leading the money list.

2011

Kuchar started off 2011 well with three consecutive top-10 finishes in the first three weeks of the season. He finished T6 at the opening PGA Tour event, the Hyundai Tournament of Champions on Maui. The following week at the Sony Open in Hawaii, he played his way to a T5 finish and then at the Bob Hope Classic achieved a T7 finish.

In February, Kuchar reached the semi-finals of the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship, where he suffered a 6&5 defeat by eventual champion Luke Donald. In the 3rd place playoff match, he defeated fellow American Bubba Watson, 2&1. Previously during the week Kuchar had beaten Anders Hansen on the 22nd hole in round one, Bo Van Pelt in round two, Rickie Fowler in round three and Y.E. Yang at the quarter-final stage.

Kuchar finished tied for second at the Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village in June 2011 behind Steve Stricker. This was his eighth top-10 finish of the season and took him to his highest ranking to date of world number six. Kuchar finished second at The Barclays, two strokes behind the winner, Dustin Johnson. The tournament was shortened to 54 holes due to Hurricane Irene. This finish moved him to second in the FedEx Cup standings. Kuchar and Gary Woodland combined to win the Omega Mission Hills World Cup in November.

2012

Kuchar had his best performance in a major championship at The Masters when he finished in a tie for third. Kuchar was tied for the lead on the back nine on Sunday, but bogeyed the par three 16th and finished two strokes out of the playoff between Bubba Watson and Louis Oosthuizen.

Kuchar won the biggest tournament of his career in May when he won The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. He shot a final round of 70 (−2) to win by two strokes over runners-up Rickie Fowler, Martin Laird, Ben Curtis, and Zach Johnson. He entered the final round in the last group, one stroke behind Kevin Na. After bogeying the first hole, he played a near-perfect round, except for a three-putt bogey on the 17th, to hold off the challengers. The win elevated Kuchar to a career high of number five in the world rankings.

2013

He won the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship in February, defeating Hunter Mahan 2&1 in the final. During the final, Kuchar built up an early lead and was 4 up at the turn. Mahan mounted a comeback on the back nine, winning four of the next seven holes to trail by just one with two to play. Mahan's wild drive on the par-4 17th put him in trouble, and after Kuchar knocked his approach close, Mahan failed to chip in for par and conceded the hole, which ended the match and gave Kuchar his first World Golf Championship title. Throughout the week, Kuchar was never more than one down in any of his matches and only trailed three times on his way to the win. He defeated Hiroyuki Fujita, Sergio García, Nicolas Colsaerts, Robert Garrigus and Jason Day en route to the final. Kuchar moved back into the world's top 10 after this victory. His second win in 2013 came at the Memorial Tournament in early June.

2014

In the final round of the Valero Texas Open in March, Kuchar held a share of the lead with nine holes to play but bogeyed the 10th and 11th holes and finished T-4. The next week, he had a four-stroke lead going into the final round at the Shell Houston Open but lost a playoff to Matt Jones' 42-yard chip-in on the first extra hole. Kuchar was again in contention the following week at the Masters Tournament, where he was tied for the lead on Sunday before four-putting the fourth hole and finishing T-5.

A week later, Kuchar won for the seventh time on the PGA Tour with a one stroke victory at the RBC Heritage. He shot a final-round 64, which included a chip-in birdie from a greenside bunker on the 18th hole to come from four shots behind and claim victory. Kuchar held the lead after the opening round, but followed this with 73-70 over rounds two and three to fall four shots back going into the final round. He birdied seven of his opening eleven holes in the final round, to move clear of the field. However he three-putted from within four feet on the 17th hole to make bogey and fall back into a tie with Luke Donald. After hitting his approach to the 18th hole into a greenside bunker, Kuchar holed out for birdie and moved one shot ahead of Donald once again. Donald was unable to birdie any of the last three holes and Kuchar claimed the victory.

Personal life

Kuchar is married to the former tennis player Sybi Parker, who was a tennis player at Georgia Tech, and they live on St. Simons Island in Georgia. Their two sons are Cameron Cole and Carson Wright. Kuchar is a Christian.

Amateur wins (2)

• 1997 Terra Cotta Invitational, U.S. Amateur

Professional wins (12)

PGA Tour wins (7)

Legend

World Golf Championships (1)

FedEx Cup playoff event (1)

Other PGA Tour (5)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up
1	Mar 10, 2002	Honda Classic	68-69-66-66=269	−19	2 strokes	Brad Faxon, Joey Sindelar
2	Oct 5, 2009	Turning Stone Resort Championship	67-68-67-69=271	−17	Playoff	Vaughn Taylor
3	Aug 29, 2010	The Barclays	68-69-69-66=272	−12	Playoff	Martin Laird
4	May 13, 2012	The Players Championship	68-68-69-70=275	−13	2 strokes	Ben Curtis, Rickie Fowler, Zach Johnson, Martin Laird
5	Feb 24, 2013	WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship	2 and 1			Hunter Mahan
6	Jun 2, 2013	The Memorial Tournament	68-70-70-68=276	−12	2 strokes	Kevin Chappell
7	Apr 20, 2014	RBC Heritage	66-73-70-64=273	−11	1 stroke	Luke Donald

PGA Tour playoff record (2-1)

No.	Year	Tournament	Opponent	Result
1	2009	Turning Stone Resort Championship	Vaughn Taylor	Won with par on sixth extra hole
2	2010	The Barclays	Martin Laird	Won with birdie on first extra hole
3	2014	Shell Houston Open	Matt Jones	Lost to birdie on first extra hole

Nationwide Tour wins (1)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	May 21, 2006	Henrico County Open	71-67-69-72=279	−9	Playoff	Paul Claxton

PGA Tour of Australasia wins (1)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	Oct 18, 2015	Fiji International1	74-72-69-69=284	−4	4 strokes	Aron Price

1 Co-sanctioned with the OneAsia Tour

Other wins (3)

• 2011 CVS Caremark Charity Classic (with Zach Johnson), Omega Mission Hills World Cup (with Gary Woodland)
• 2013 Franklin Templeton Shootout (with Harris English)

Results in major championships

Tournament	1998	1999
Masters Tournament	T21LA	T50
U.S. Open	T14LA	CUT
The Open Championship	CUT	DNP
PGA Championship	DNP	DNP

Tournament	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
Masters Tournament	DNP	DNP	CUT	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
U.S. Open	DNP	DNP	CUT	DNP	DNP	CUT	CUT	DNP	T48	CUT
The Open Championship	DNP	DNP	CUT	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	CUT	CUT	CUT
PGA Championship	DNP	DNP	CUT	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	CUT

Tournament	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016
Masters Tournament	T24	T27	T3	T8	T5	T46	T24
U.S. Open	T6	T14	T27	T28	T12	T12
The Open Championship	T27	CUT	T9	T15	T54	T58
PGA Championship	T10	T19	CUT	T22	DNP	T7

LA = Low Amateur
DNP = Did not play
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" = tied
Yellow background for top-10.

Summary

Tournament	Wins	2nd	3rd	Top-5	Top-10	Top-25	Events	Cuts made
Masters Tournament	0	0	1	2	3	6	10	9
U.S. Open	0	0	0	0	1	5	13	8
The Open Championship	0	0	0	0	1	2	11	5
PGA Championship	0	0	0	0	2	4	7	4
Totals	0	0	1	2	7	17	41	26

• Most consecutive cuts made - 12 (2013 Masters - 2016 Masters, current)
• Longest streak of top-10s - 1 (seven times, current)

World Golf Championships

Wins (1)

Year	Championship	54 holes	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner-up
2013	WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship	n/a	2 & 1		Hunter Mahan

Results timeline

Results not in chronological order prior to 2015.

Tournament	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008
Cadillac Championship	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Dell Match Play	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Bridgestone Invitational	T38	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP

Tournament	2009	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016
Cadillac Championship	DNP	T3	5	T8	T35	T13	T23	T28
Dell Match Play	DNP	R32	3	QF	1	R16	T34	R16
Bridgestone Invitational	DNP	T9	T19	T8	T27	T12	T25
HSBC Champions	T19	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP

• DNP = Did not play
• QF, R16, R32, R64 = Round in which player lost in match play
• "T" = tied
• Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-10.
• Note that the HSBC Champions did not become a WGC event until 2009.

PGA Tour career summary

Season	Wins	Earnings (US$)	Rank
2001	0	572,669	92
2002	1	1,237,725	49
2003	0	176,047	182
2004	0	509,257	139
2005	0	402,786	159
2006	0	30,297	241
2007	0	886,146	115
2008	0	1,447,638	70
2009	1	2,489,193	24
2010	1	4,910,477	1
2011	0	4,233,920	6
2012	1	3,903,065	11
2013	2	5,616,808	3
2014	1	4,695,515	9
2015	0	2,774,170	28
Career*	7	33,885,712	13

* As of the 2014-15 season.

U.S. national team appearances

Amateur

• Eisenhower Trophy: 1998
• Palmer Cup: 1998 (tie), 1999 (winners)
• Walker Cup: 1999

Professional

• Ryder Cup: 2010, 2012, 2014
• Presidents Cup: 2011 (winners), 2013 (winners), 2015 (winners)
• World Cup: 2011 (winners), 2013

[ Source: Wikipedia ]