Saturday, June 23, 2001
Woods, after flirting with
cut, gets into contention
By JOEL STASHENKO
Associated Press Writer
HARRISON, N.Y. (AP) — Tiger Woods made
a long day of golf in the rain-delayed Buick Classic very interesting.
In danger of missing the cut for the first
time in 71 tournaments after an opening 4-over 75 on Friday morning,
Woods shot a 66 in the second round to move into contention at
1 under.
That was not far behind the early second-round
leaders Stewart Cink, Robert Allenby, Vijay Singh and J.P. Hayes,
who were all at 5-under 137.
“The good thing about playing this
golf course and this tournament is that you get rewarded for shooting
good rounds,” said Woods, whose 75 was his worst round of
the year.
“You go out there and you post a round
in the mid-60s, you are definitely going to move up.”
And move up Woods did. His 75 in the morning
was only good for a tie for 118th place. As he posted his score
in the second round, he had moved into the top 20 although about
half the golfers in the field were still out on the course or
had yet to tee off due to Thursday's rain.
Dozens of players were expected to not finish
their rounds before dark Friday and have to do so before Saturday's
third round.
Woods was so off his game in Friday's first
round that he even had a triple bogey — a first for him since
the first round of the Bay Hill Invitational in March, a span
of 499 holes.
He drove into the trees on the par-4 fourth
hole, missed the green on his third shot with an 8-iron and three-putted
from about 6 feet.
“Oh Tiger, Oh Tiger,” his caddie
Steve Williams muttered when Woods missed the second putt.
But suddenly, in the afternoon, Woods was
again the world's best player.
He drove the green on the par-4, 314-yard
10th hole — his first of the second round — and two-putted
for a birdie. He made another birdie by holing a 35-foot bunker
shot from a greenside bunker on No. 16 and sank an 8-footer for
birdie on the par-5 18th.
He again used his length off the tee on
the short par-4 seventh to make another birdie — that got
him back to even par and removed any question of him making the
cut — and finished the round with a two-putt birdie on the
par-5 ninth.
“That's why he's No. 1 in the world,”
Singh said.
Woods played 35 holes Friday plus tapping
in for a par on No. 1 to complete the only hole he started before
Thursday's final rain delay.
“I put myself behind the eight-ball
starting out in the first round but I really played well in the
afternoon,” Woods said. “I wasn't swinging well, but
I started out with the first shot in the afternoon, on 10, and
I drove it to about 12 feet. That usually helps things. From there
I hit the ball really well.”
Woods said there was no magic trick involved
in his turnaround. Players were allowed to lift and clean their
ball in the second round during Thursday's heavy rain.
“We were able to play lift, clean and
cheat today,” Woods said. “If you have ball in hand,
anytime you can do that you feel like being pretty aggressive.”
Considering his disappointment on the 72nd
hole of the U.S. Open last weekend, Cink's performance was impressive.
He was the first-round leader with a 65 and he kept his second
round together for a 1-over 72 despite shaky putting.
Cink missed an 18-inch putt at the U.S.
Open which would have put him in a playoff with Mark Brooks and
the eventual champion Letief Goosen. He referred to it as “the
last little putt I missed” on Friday.
“I am not thinking about the little
short putt on the end because as far as I am concerned, I had
no business being in the playoff after I made a bogey on the last
hole,” Cink said. “Retief was going to two-putt. I was
just trying to get out of his way. That is over. I have talked
enough about that.”
But he said he is thinking positively about
the Open just the same.
“I played great and I have a lot of
confidence about all my shots,” Cink said.
Singh, winner of the Buick Classic in 1993
and 1995, eagled the par-5 ninth hole both times he played it
Friday.
Divots:
No one comes close to Woods' string of consecutive cuts made.
Singh has the second-longest current streak with 19. The PGA record
is 113 events, set by Byron Nelson in the 1940s. ... David Duval
drove the short par-4 seventh hole in his second round Friday,
landing the ball within about 20 feet of where Paul Azinger was
lining up his putt. Azinger stepped away from the ball and looked
quizzically back toward the tee, then made his short putt for
par.
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