Maja Stark of Sweden continued the steady play she demonstrated all week to win the U.S. Women’s Open on Sunday at Erin Hills for her first major championship.

Stark shot an even-par 72 to finish at 7-under 281, two strokes ahead of top-ranked Nelly Korda and Japan’s Rio Takeda.

Stark earned $2.4 million in the biggest event of the women’s golf season. The 25-year-old Stark became the sixth Swede to win a women’s major, and the first since Anna Nordqvist in the 2021 Women’s British Open. The former Oklahoma State player is the first Swede to win a U.S. Women’s Open since Annika Sorenstam in 2006.

Stark won her second second LPGA Tour title. She also won the 2022 ISPS Handa World Invitational in Northern Ireland, an event co-sanctioned by Ladies European Tour.

Korda closed with a 71, and Takeda had a 72.

Hye-Jin Choi (68), Ruoning Yin (70) and Mao Saigo (73) tied for fourth at 4 under. Hailee Cooper (70) and Hinako Shibuno (74) were 3 under.

Stark took a one-stroke lead into the final round and had said Saturday she wanted to make sure she played freely, noting that “no one has ever played well when they’ve been playing scared, and I think that’s been my habit before, to just kind of try to hang on to it.”

It was her consistency that ultimately made the difference as Stark stayed ahead throughout the day and held off the challengers.

This still was as close as Korda has come to winning a U.S. Women’s Open. Her best previous finish was a tie for eighth place in 2022 at Pine Needles.

Korda made birdied Nos. 7 and 8, but missed a 9-foot birdie putt on No. 9 that would have tied her for the lead. Korda’s birdie attempt on No. 9 came minutes after Stark’s bogey-free streak ended at 21 on No. 7.

Stark then extended her lead to three by making a 14-foot birdie putt on No. 11 immediately after Korda missed a par putt of just under 5 feet at No. 13.

Korda, Shibuno and Takeda got within two strokes of Stark with birdies on the par-5 14th, though Korda missed a 14-foot eagle putt and Shibuno missed an eagle attempt from 9 1/2 feet.

Stark then made a birdie of her own on No. 14 to regain her three-stroke advantage at 9 under. She bogeyed the last two holes.

Scheffler joins Woods as only repeat winners at Memorial in Ohio

Scottie Scheffler never lost the lead and never gave anyone much of a chance down the stretch Sunday in another relentless performance, closing with a 2-under 70 for a four-shot victory to join Tiger Woods as the only repeat winners of the Memorial.

Slowed by hand surgery at the start of the year from a freak accident, Scheffler appears to be in full stride with one major already in the bag and another around the corner at the U.S. Open.

“It’s always a hard week,” said Scheffler, who finished at 10-under 278. “We battled really hard on the weekend. Overall it was a great week.”

On one of the tougher PGA Tour tests of the year, Scheffler made one bogey over the final 40 holes at Muirfield Village.

“Well, you did it again,” tournament host Jack Nicklaus told him walking off the green.

Ben Griffin tried to make it interesting at the end with a 12-foot eagle on the par-5 15th and a 25-foot birdie putt on the par-3 16th to close within two shots with two to play. Scheffler, however, doesn’t make mistakes. Griffin made double bogey on the 17th.

Griffin made a 4-foot par on the 18th for a 73 to finish alone in second, worth $2.2 million, more than what he earned when he won at Colonial last week.

Sepp Straka (70) finished another shot back.

“You know Scottie’s probably going to play a good round of golf. The guy’s relentless. He loves competition, and he doesn’t like giving up shots,” Straka said. “But it’s one of those courses where it can always happen, so you got to be prepared for it. I felt like I gave myself a lot of chances to kind of make a push.”

Scheffler now has won three times in his last four starts — the exception was Colonial, a tie for fourth the week after winning the PGA Championship — and expanded his margin at No. 1 in the world to levels not seen since Woods in his peak years.

Woods is a five-time winner at Memorial who won three straight from 1999 through 2001. No one had repeated at Muirfield Village since then until Scheffler.

His performances lately look a lot more like Nicklaus the way he wears down the field by rarely getting out of position.