Tuesday, July 31, 2001
Woods, Sorenstam win mixed
team match
By DOUG FERGUSON
AP Golf Writer
PALM DESERT, Calif. (AP) — The best
women players joined Tiger Woods and David Duval in prime time
Monday and delivered an entertaining show — but hardly the
kind of golf anyone expected from the foursome of major championship
winners.
Woods and Annika Sorenstam rallied from
2-down with three holes to play and won the “Battle at Bighorn”
against Duval and Karrie Webb in 19 holes.
Sorenstam made a 10-foot birdie putt on
the 18th hole to continue the alternate-shot match, and the pair
closed out the victory when Webb hit into a bunker and Duval missed
a 12-foot par putt.
In a made-for-TV event that provided women's
golf its largest audience ever, the outcome was more cause for
relief than celebration.
Both teams shot 4-over 76, although the
conditions were brutal with hot, blustery wind and brick-hard
greens.
Woods and Sorenstam were each forced to
hit a shot left-handed in the alternate-shot format. Duval and
Webb squandered a 2-up lead with three holes to play. What looked
at times like a husband-wife mixer at the club turned into a grind
under the lights.
It finished under the lights, and there
was some fear it wouldn't finish until morning.
When it was over, Woods and Sorenstam shared
$1.2 million from the $1.7 million purse.
As with the previous two Monday Night Golf
exhibitions, the only success that really matters will be the
TV ratings that will be released later this week.
Woods vs. Duval got a 6.9 rating two years
ago in the inaugural event, while Sergio Garcia's 1-up victory
over Woods last year garnered a 7.6. Anything close to that will
represent the largest audience to see women play golf.
“This is one of the biggest days in
LPGA history, if not the biggest day, based on the number of eyeballs
that are going to be on our product,” LPGA commissioner Ty
Votaw said a few hours before the match.
“Any time we have the same number of
eyeballs watching Tiger Woods and David Duval as are watching
Karrie Webb and Annika Sorenstam, it has to be an enormous platform
for us to show 10 million viewers that we have good golf on the
LPGA Tour.”
Webb and Sorenstam headed for the airport
for a charter flight to England for the Women's British Open,
their final major of the season. They gave up two days of practice
to give the LPGA an audience like never before.
Only time will tell if it pays off.
Duval and Webb seized control when Sorenstam's
25-foot birdie putt on No. 14 rolled off the green and onto the
fairway, and they went 2-up when Webb rifled a 3-iron into the
green on the 528-yard 15th hole.
That was one of the last few good shots.
Needing a birdie on the 18th hole to send
the match to extra holes, Sorenstam pushed her drive into the
right rough. Webb followed with a tee shot into a bunker.
Woods saved the day with a wedge to 10 feet,
and Sorenstam pumped her fist when her putt dropped to send the
match to overtime.
Sorenstam again went into the rough, this
time down the left side. Webb took out a 3-wood and again went
into the bunker, only this time Duval caught too much sand and
couldn't reach the green.
Woods hit a high wedge to 40 feet, and Sorenstam
nursed the putt down to tap-in range. The final stroke belonged
to Woods.
Give two thumbs up to the production.
The golf was another matter.
Woods hit what was believed to be his first
left-handed shot in competition when Sorenstam's drive landed
on the edge of a bunker and left him no other choice. On the next
hole, Woods' returned the favor when his drive nestled in a desert
bush, and Sorenstam was forced to whack it out left-handed.
The women didn't do themselves any favors
in trying to shake the perception that they can't putt.
Webb hit a putt from the back fringe on
No. 2 that traveled 80 feet — no big deal, except that she
was only 20 feet away when she started.
“The wind, the grain, the slope and
Indio,” Duval told her as they walked off the green, mentioning
all the factors to keep in mind when putting on greens in the
California desert. All putts tend to break toward Indio, the low
spot in the Coachella Valley.
With the match all square on the 14th, Sorenstam
played too much break in her 25-foot birdie attempt. “Bite,
bite!” Woods yelled, to no avail. The ball trickled all the
way off the green and down into the fairway.
Sorenstam had no excuse — she's a member
at Bighorn.
The match had a few light moments, too.
Sorenstam's approach on No. 1 sailed right
of the green, down a hill into a patch of desert weeds so deep
that Woods could barely find it. When Sorenstam saw the position
she put him in, she bit her lip and offered an apologetic smile.
Duval hit a brilliant pitch over the slope
to 4 feet on No. 6, and when Webb holed the par putt, Sorenstam
waited to hear that her 2-foot par putt was conceded.
Silence.
Woods stared at Duval in mock disbelief,
and Duval simply shrugged his shoulders. Right as Sorenstam was
getting ready to hit the putt, Duval called out, “That's
good.”
Overall, the golf was less than spectacular
by all four players. Then again, the conditions played a huge
factor. The greens were brick-hard and slick, and gusts up to
20 mph made it difficult to control the ball and judge the distance.
This was all about production, and that
included a few birdies and bogeys.
The players wore microphones, but it was
hard to hear what they were saying — and it didn't sound
like they were saying much, anyway. The best emotion came from
Webb, who was in tears at end of a taped interview about her paralyzed
coach in Australia.
The LPGA also took advantage of its first
prime-time appearance by airing its new “Positively Amazing”
advertising campaign, which showed baby pictures of its top stars
to a hip-hop version of the song, “Thank Heavens For Little
Girls.”
By the end of the night, the theme song
could have been, “Thank Heavens It's Over.”
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