DiMarco, Riley make Ryder Cup
HAVEN, Wis. — Chris DiMarco and Chris Riley faced knee-knocking pressure in the PGA Championship. And what did they get for their efforts?
More of the same.
DiMarco and Riley played themselves into the pressure-packed Ryder Cup with their performances Sunday in the year’s final major. DiMarco finished second after a three-man, three-hole playoff and Riley was fourth — good enough to knock Jay Haas and Steve Flesch out of the top 10 in the Ryder Cup standings.
Justin Leonard needed to win the tournament to make the team, but he missed a 12-foot putt on No. 18 to win in regulation and he couldn’t manage a birdie on the extra holes. Vijay Singh won his third career major when he made birdie on the first extra hole, No. 10, and it stood up as they played the 17th and 18th.
That put Riley on and left Leonard among a handful of others hoping to be one of captain Hal Sutton’s two picks.
“It’s gut-wrenching coming down to the end,” Riley said. “To play for your country, I got chills out there thinking about it. I really am proud of myself. … To finish fourth in a major championship — it’s pretty awesome and I feel really good.”
DiMarco made two double bogeys the final round at the ‘01 PGA, four strokes that kept him from making the U.S. team that year. He only needed an eighth-place tie to make it this year, so all he was playing for in the extra holes was his first major title.
After hitting his 6-iron onto the green at No. 18, “I looked at my caddie and said, ‘That’s good enough, for sure,’ ” DiMarco said. “I’m proud of myself that I went out and did it.”
Riley, 30, is expecting his first child on Sept. 17. When he missed a 4-foot putt on the 18th, he figured he would be home with his family when the Ryder Cup starts at Oakland Hills in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., but he made the team when Leonard didn’t.
Fred Funk, 48, would have been knocked off the team only if Leonard, Riley and DiMarco had all made it. Having missed the cut, he was watching on television and doing the calculations in his head.
“It hasn’t really hit me yet, other than I’m getting a million phone calls,” he told the Associated Press. “That was my goal going into this year. To have it actually happen at this stage in my career, it’s a great way to finish my regular tour career.”
Funk played in the Presidents Cup last year at Fancourt in South Africa, where DiMarco made a clutch putt on the 17th hole on the final day. “Hal said, ‘Just take that moment, with a Ryder Cup on American soil, and multiply it by a 100,’ ” Funk said.
The Ryder Cup race has been called the tournament within a tournament and, in the end, it was almost as exciting as the main one.
Seven players had clinched a spot regardless of what happened at the year’s final major: Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Davis Love III, Jim Furyk, Kenny Perry, David Toms and Chad Campbell.