Golf roundup
Kaye leads Greater Hartford Open CROMWELL, Conn. (AP) – Jonathan Kaye is doing his best to stay out of trouble – on and off the course.
Suspended for two months and placed on probation for the season after a confrontation with a security guard, Kaye shot a 5-under 65 Saturday to put himself in position for a breakthrough victory.
“It would give me a little job security. That’s for sure,” said Kaye, winless in six full seasons on the PGA Tour. “It would be a dream come true to win on the tour. That’s what everybody wants to do, establish themselves and gain the respect of their peers.”
That respect won’t come easily after his costly tantrum last year during the Michelob Championship.
With security heightened a month after the Sept. 11 attacks, the guard stopped Kaye from entering the locker room without his tour money clip, which doubles as an identification badge. He then returned with the clip attached to the zipper of his pants.
“They’re all stories. You could probably get a better answer from the tour on that,” Kaye said of the PGA Tour, which he knows does not comment on disciplinary measures.
He had a 13-under 197 total on the TPC at River Highlands to take a one-stroke lead over Scott Verplank into the final round.
“I’ll treat it as just another round of golf,” Kaye said. “I just need to keep doing what I’ve been doing.”
Verplank, who matched the course record with a 61 in the final round last year, birdied six straight holes on the back nine for a 63. Scott Hoch was two strokes back at 11 under after a 66, and Davis Love III shot a 68 to reach 10 under.
Phil Mickelson played the last three holes in 3 over for a 66, leaving the defending champion five strokes back at 8 under along with Steve Pate (66), Jim Carter (66) and Hidemichi Tanaka (68).
Mickelson, the leader at 11 under after 15 holes, hit into the water on the par-3 16th en route to his second double bogey of the week and dropped another stroke on No. 18. He came up 10 yards short with a pitching wedge on the 160-yard 16th.
“It was just a stock wedge and I just didn’t hit it hard enough,” Mickelson said.
Paired with Sergio Garcia, Mickelson matched the front-nine record with a 6-under 29 and reached 11 under with a two-putt birdie on the par-5 13th.
“I played really well on the front nine and still had a couple of missed opportunities,” said Mickelson, who shot a 61 in the third round last year. “I certainly didn’t finish the way I wanted. I’ll have to shoot low tomorrow to get myself back in it.”
Kaye, playing a new set of Cleveland irons this week, birdied three of the last six holes – using precise iron play to set up putts of 4, 6 and 2 feet. He also got up and down for par from 150 yards on the par-4 10th after nearly driving out of bounds.
“Something happened behind me and I kind of lost my concentration and sprayed it out to the right,” Kaye said. “It hit a tree and kicked behind a snack bar a yard from out of bounds.”
He chipped to the fairway and hit an 8-iron to 4 feet.
Verplank, the Ryder Cup player who has overcome a series of elbow problems and a recent thumb injury, began his birdie run with a 3-foot putt on No. 12 and added putts of 8, 4, 6, 10 and 3 feet.
“You just basically try to get out of your own way,” Verplank said. “You try to stay relaxed and not force anything. I do a lot better if I don’t pay attention to the score.”
DIVOTS: Garcia and Ernie Els shot 69s, leaving Garcia at 5 under and Els at 2 under. … Mickelson, second last week in the U.S. Open, is making his last start before the British Open. He won the Bob Hope Classic in January for his 20th tour title. … The winner will receive $720,000 from the $4 million purse.
Baltimore Classic
HUNT VALLEY, Md. – J.C. Snead shot a course record 8-under 64, making an eagle and seven birdies to roar from behind and tie Rodger Davis for the lead after two rounds of the Greater Baltimore Classic.
“That was fun. I kept the ball in play all day and didn’t get in any trouble,” said the 61-year-old Snead, who started the day four shots back.
Snead, vying for his first win on the senior tour since 1995, chipped in from 20 feet for a birdie on the 18th hole to cap his finest round of the year and set a record for the low score at the six-year-old Hayfields Country Club course.
“It feels good,” Snead said, “but for me, at this stage of the game, the wheels can fly off at any minute. When you haven’t played very well for a while, it’s not easy.”
Davis shot a 68 for an 11-under 133 total.
“If anything, I’m a little bit disappointed. I missed three putts of about three feet,” said Davis, an Australian who last win on American soil was in the 1986 NEC World Series of Golf.
John Mahaffey, who began the round in a first-place tie with Davis and Jim Ahern, bogeyed 18 for a 69 and a 134 total. Ahern shot a 71 to close at 136, tied with John Jacobs in fourth place.
Snead wasted no time in beginning his climb up the leaderboard, getting birdies on each of the first four holes to go 7-under. After six straight pars, he birdied No. 11 and got an eagle on 12 – a 398-yard, par-4 – by connecting with an 8-iron from 133 yards.
He fell back to 9-under with a bogey on 15, but rebounded with a birdie on 16 before closing out the day with a birdie on the par-5 18th that was indicative of his memorable afternoon.
“My caddy told me by third shot was 102 yards; it was really 84. I ended up hitting it into the back bunker,” Snead said. “But I escaped.”
Although Snead shaved five shots off his first-round score, he insisted that his performance Saturday wasn’t all that different.
“I didn’t really play that much better today than yesterday,” he said, “other than the eagle and holing that bunker shot on 18.”
The 64 tied the tournament record set by Jose Maria Canizares in 2000.
Regardless of how he fares today, Snead is already assured $39,000 for winning the Super Seniors portion of the tournament (best two-round score by a player at least 60 years of age).
“That was some round by J.C.,” Davis said. “Doesn’t he realize he’s a Super?”
Davis had three birdies on the front nine, then made his only bogey of the day by three-putting from 15 feet on No. 11. But he rebounded with birdies on 14 and 16.
“All in all, I hit the ball pretty solid again,” he said. “I’m feeling pretty relaxed on this course. It’s a course I think I can win on.”
Mahaffey was tied for the lead until he bogeyed 18 after sending his approach over the green. But he was thankful to be in the hunt.
“It’s nice to shoot a 69 and feel that you played not that great,” he said. “I was just a little off today, but I’m encouraged where I’m at.”
Bruce Fleisher shot a 70 to finish in a tie with Doug Tewell and Bobby Walzel at 137, four shots behind the leaders.
Rochester Invitational
PITTSFORD, N.Y. – Mi Hyun Kim shot her second straight 5-under-par 67 to take sole possession of the lead Saturday after three rounds at the LPGA Rochester International.
Kim’s third straight round in the 60s put her at 13-under 203, five shots ahead of Australia’s Karrie Webb, who rallied with birdies on her final three holes to finish with her second straight 72 and a 208 total.
Defending champion Laura Davies, who had a 69, was another shot back and Juli Inkster was alone in fourth at 210 after a solid 67. Se Ri Pak also had a 67 and was at 211, while Beth Daniel skied to a 74 and was tied with Gloria Park at 212.
Naree Wongluekiet, a 16-year-old amateur from Thailand, continued her solid play with a 73 and was at 216.
Kim, who began the day tied with Webb, got going quickly with a birdie on the first hole to take the lead and moved two shots ahead when Webb bogeyed the par-5 fourth hole.
Kim’s accuracy – she hit 14 greens in regulation – kept leaving her with easy birdie putts. She converted a 4-footer on the first hole, a 2-footer at No. 6, and an 8-footer at No. 8.
A 20-foot birdie putt at the ninth hole gave Kim a four-shot lead over Webb, who struggled off the tee for the second straight round and carded four bogeys.
Webb hit only seven of 14 fairways and had to watch her playing partner quickly pull away, her pigtails bouncing with every step as the galleries cheered the 25-year-old Korean.
Webb easily could have been closer if a couple of long putts had dropped. Off the fringe at Nos. 6 and 7, each putt stopped less than 2 inches from the hole and she had to settle for pars.
Davies, who had an eagle on the par-5 eighth hole, reached 8 under with a birdie at 11 but bogeyed 17 and faced the daunting task of making up six strokes on Sunday against a player who has shot in the 60s on six of her last seven rounds.
Daniel also had an up-and-down round. She began the day at 6 under, dropped to 3 under with a bogey at No. 2 and a double bogey on No. 3, then rallied with three birdies before the turn. Bogeys at 11 and 18 dropped her out of contention heading into the final round.
Rookie Candie Kung notched the third ace of the tournament and the second at the ninth hole, a 145-yard par-3. Ironically, her playing partner Saturday was Becky Iverson, who had the first hole-in-one of the tournament at No. 9 on Thursday. Leta Lindley aced No. 15 on the first day.
The hole-in-one was the ninth on the LPGA Tour this season.
North Open
HEXHAM, England – Germany’s Sven Struever shot a 6-under-par 66 to share the lead with England’s David Gilford and Miles Tunnicliff after the three rounds of the Great North Open.
Struever, the overnight leader, lost and then regained the lead at the Slaley Hall course before a bogey on the final hole dropped him back into a tie with Gilford and Tunnicliff.
Gilford, a two-time Ryder Cup player in 1991 and “95, made up six shots on Tunnicliff, his playing partner, on the back nine as he completed a 67. Tunnicliff hit six birdies in seven holes and shot a 68.
David Lynn and Brian Davis, a pair of Englishmen, were each one stroke behind at 5-under with Ireland’s Gary Murphy, Rolf Muntz of the Netherlands and Belgian Nicolas Vanhootegem.