LPGA Championship remains up for grabs
Pat Hurst let everyone back into the LPGA Championship with a four-putt double bogey. Michelle Wie might be tied for the lead if not for missing a par putt from 18 inches.
Not even Annika Sorenstam was immune from a crazy, windswept Saturday at Bulle Rock in Havre de Grace, Md., with a two-shot penalty that sent her spiraling down the leaderboard and likely out of contention for a fourth straight title in this major. When the sun finally set on a long day filled with mistakes and blown putts, the tournament was up for grabs.
Hurst missed a 6-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole and had to settle for an even-par 72. That left her tied for the lead with Japanese sensation Ai Miyazato, who lost a 54-hole lead a week ago trying to win for the first time on the LPGA Tour, and gets another chance.
They were at 7-under 209, one shot ahead of a group that includes Wie.
The 16-year-old from Hawaii three-putted for bogey three times, none as shocking as the par-3 17th. Standing over what looked to be a tap-in for par, she caught the left edge of the cup and stood in the fading sunlight with a stunned look on her face. Wie rebounded with a 10-foot birdie on the final hole for a 1-under 71, still believing she can be golf’s youngest major champion.
“This golf course still owes me a really good round,” Wie said.
Sorenstam birdied her first hole and marched confidently down the second fairway, ready to make a charge and silence anyone who has questioned her game over a seven-tournament drought. But she lifted a chunk of sod from a divot hole next to her ball, Karrie Webb had no choice but to call the penalty, and Sorenstam got a two-stroke penalty.
“It was a mistake I made,” Sorenstam said after stumbling to a 75, leaving her six shots behind with 21 players between her and the leaders. “It’s never too late, but things have to change.”
Webb was rattled by having to call the penalty shot on Sorenstam and was sliding out of contention until she rallied to shoot 72, joining the group at 4-under 212. Wendy Ward, of Edwall, Wash., was another stroke back after a 70. Rathrdum’s Tracy Hanson shot 75 in the rain-delayed second round and missed the cut.
PGA Tour
Billy Andrade moved into position for his second Westchester victory, shooting a 2-under 69 in windy conditions to take a one-stroke lead over Vijay Singh and Adam Scott in the Barclays Classic at Harrison, N.Y. Andrade, the 1991 champion who won the last of his four PGA Tour titles in 2000, has an 8-under 205 total on the soggy Westchester Country Club course.
Singh, tied for the second-round lead with David Howell after a bogey-free 64 Friday, shot a 72. Scott, the first-round leader, matched Andrade with a 69.
Champions Tour
Instead of Graham Marsh and Don Pooley teeing it up, fish frolicked along the flooded fairways and bunkers at Nashawtuc Country Club course at Concord, Mass., as rain and the overflowing Sudbury River forced the Champions Tour to postpone the entire Bank of America Championship.
Officials are trying to reschedule for an open weekend Sept. 22-24. If they can’t, it will be the tour’s first cancellation since the weekend after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
With carp jumping on the 18th fairway and the par-3 eighth inconveniently converted to an island green, tour officials abandoned plans to hold a shortened 36-hole event on a truncated course.
Nos. 1, 9, 10, 14 and 16 also were unplayable.