.jpg)
Steve Stricker and Tiger Woods trounced their International team opponents in foursome
and four-ball matches at the Presidents Cup (Photo: AP/Eric Risberg)
After all four players missed long birdie putts on the last hole of the final Presidents Cup match of the day, the U.S. took a daunting 12.5-to-9.5-point lead over the International team heading into Sunday’s final round.
With darkness descending on San Francisco, and none of the members of the final foursome -- Phil Mickelson and Sean O’Hair for the U.S., and Tim Clark and Vijay Singh for the Internationals -- able to hole his putt, the two teams halved the match.
Clark barely missed his seventh birdie of the day when his 15-footer hit the left side of the hole and lipped out. Singh had almost the same length and distance, but his birdie putt followed Clark’s in a power lip-out.
Even with his successful new putting stroke, Mickelson was unable to convert his attempt. “It’s been a long, hard-fought battle,” he told NBC following the 18-hole, back-and-forth match. “It was a fun match, a fun day.”
Glass is half full. International team captain Greg Norman put a happy face on the outcome of Saturday’s four-ball and foursome matches. “My guys are in a great place,” he said to NBC.
The fact is, however, Norman’s boys have their work cut out for them. Here are some sobering stats for the Internationals: The U.S. needs just five points to claim victory, no team trailing going into the singles matches has come from behind to win the Presidents Cup, and the Internationals have never won on U.S. soil.
Mr. October. Move over, Reggie Jackson; there’s a new Mr. October and he is PGA Tour star Steve Stricker.
With a bunch of birdies during his and Tiger Woods’ Saturday afternoon four-ball match, Stricker carried his team to a 4-and-2 win. Stricker birdied seven of the match’s 16 holes, including six in an eight-holes span through the first 12.
Amazingly, Stricker’s partner, the world’s top-ranked golfer, made just one birdie during the afternoon round against the International’s Y.E. Yang and Ryo Ishikawa. With his partner drilling home putts from seven feet to 32 feet, though, Woods could just hitch his Nikes to Stricker’s carry bag and take in the sights of the city from Harding Park golf course.
"I helped out on three holes all day -- 17 and 18 this morning and then here [at 16]," Woods told NBC following his and Stricker’s most recent dismantling of an International team.
Stricker and Woods compiled a perfect 4-0 record as a twosome in this year’s Presidents Cup. That included the pair’s morning four-ball win (1-up over Mike Weir and Clark).
“The putter was my friend this afternoon,” Stricker said to NBC. “What [Tiger] did this morning, I wanted to do something. We were reading [the putts] really well.”
Too bad U.S. captain Fred Couples can’t figure out a way to pair Stricker and Woods up for Sunday’s singles matches.
Not close. The Stricker/Woods match was more of a blowout than the final numbers would indicate. The U.S. duo was 6-up with six to play, but the Internationals fought back to take the match to the 16th. The U.S. team finally closed it out on 16, after Ishikawa bombed in a long-range birdie putt of his own on the 15th.
How good was Stricker? Here’s a rundown, thanks to the PGA Tour, of several of his birdie putts on Saturday afternoon:
- Hole 3 -- 6 feet, 9 inches
- Hole 5 -- 12 feet, 9 inches
- Hole 7 -- 14 feet, 1 inch
- Hole 8 -- 9 feet, 9 inches
- Hole 10 -- 31 feet, 11 inches
Click here for the results of Saturday morning’s foursome matches and here for the tally from the afternoon four-ball matches.
Stricker and Woods conquered each of their International team opponents. Read about their overpowering victories at U.S. takes slim lead into weekend matches.
Comments