Neal Shipley Comes from Behind to Win the 2025 The Ascendant presented by Blue
By Brigette Ramirez
Neal Shipley overcame a seven-stroke deficit with a dominant round four performance to win the 2025 The Ascendant presented by Blue at 18-under par and earn his second 2025 Korn Ferry Tour title.
With the win, Shipley earns $180,000 and 500 Korn Ferry Tour Points List points, moving to No. 4 in the Korn Ferry Tour season-long standings. The top 20 players at the end of the season earn 2026 PGA TOUR membership.
The Korn Ferry Tour rookie entered Sunday’s final round tied for ninth on the leaderboard and seven strokes behind 54-hole leader Ross Steelman. In spectacular fashion, Shipley registered eight birdies and one eagle on Sunday, including a birdie on the par-4 18th hole, to record a round of 64 and defeat Jorge Fernández Valdés and Kevin Dougherty by one stroke.
With the comeback victory, Shipley becomes the first Korn Ferry Tour winner to begin a final round seven-plus strokes behind and win in regulation since Seth Reeves at the 2020 Pinnacle Bank Championship.
“I thought I had absolutely no chance if I’m being honest,” Shipley said of what he thought his chances of winning were going into Sunday’s final round. “I know Ross had been playing great and I didn’t expect him to back up like that, so that was a big surprise to me. But yeah, I mean, it was nice to be able to chase some of those guys down.”
“That was kind of still our mantra today was just to keep applying pressure to those guys that were coming in behind us. We wanted to make sure that they knew that they couldn’t trip up because someone was going to be in the clubhouse at a good number.”
Steelman ultimately finished tied for fourth at 14-under par. Fernández Valdés and Dougherty ended the week in a tie for second after shooting rounds of 68 and 69 on Sunday respectively to finish at 17-under par.
Now with a total of 1,307.550 points on the Korn Ferry Tour Points List, Shipley is projected to earn 2026 PGA TOUR membership following the conclusion of the 2025 season.
“It’s awesome,” Shipley said of de facto earning his PGA TOUR card in his first year on the Korn Ferry Tour. “I knew 300, 400 more points I’d have a good chance and to do it all in one chunk is awesome. Now we have an opportunity coming down the stretch, we’ve got a lot of golf courses that I’ve heard are great for my game. Even looking down at the Scarlet course in September, there’s a lot of courses I know I can win at. So I’m really excited, maybe hopefully pop off a third win and maybe get on the Tour a little bit quicker.”
The former Ohio State Buckeye previously won the LECOM Suncoast Classic in Lakewood Ranch, Florida, on April 19 after defeating S.T. Lee in a playoff.
With nine events remaining in the 2025 Korn Ferry Tour season, Shipley can earn automatic PGA TOUR membership through the Tour’s Three-Victory Promotion with one more win this year.