Day: March 25, 2022

Ben Martin takes two-shot lead at Corales Puntacana ChampionshipBen Martin takes two-shot lead at Corales Puntacana Championship

March 25, 2022March 25, 2022| 23:24

PUNTA CANA, Dominican Republic — Ben Martin shot his second straight 6-under 66 on Friday to double his lead to two strokes in the PGA TOUR’s Corales Puntacana Championship. RELATED: Leaderboard | WGC-Match Play Day 3 Match Recaps Martin had four birdies in a late five-hole stretch, finishing the afternoon round on the front nine at breezy Corales Golf Course. “I think the course was playing a little easier,” Martin said. “The wind was up yesterday morning more than it was this afternoon. But it was starting to dry out some in the afternoon, so a little give and take there.” He began the late run with a birdie on the par-5 fourth and added three more on the par-4 sixth, par-5 seventh and par-4 eighth. He also started fast, birdieing the first three holes. “I’ve just been in a great mindset,” Martin said. I think more than anything, my swing feels in a good place, I’m rolling it nice. So everything kind of feels easy and I’m not putting too much pressure on myself and making some birdies when I have chances, but not trying to do too much.” The 34-year-old former Clemson player has made only one other PGA TOUR start this year, missing the cut in Puerto Rico with rounds of 78 and 70. He won the 2014 Shriners Hospitals for Children Open for his lone PGA TOUR title. “Not having a great status, I think that motivated me to get back out,” Martin said. “I would say over the last six months sort of I’ve been working harder, working smarter than I have in the past four or five years.” Alex Smalley was second at 10 under after a 65. The TOUR rookie from Duke countered an opening double bogey with an eagle on No. 4 and closed with birdies on Nos. 7 and 9. On his first hole, his mother helped him by finding his ball in a bush. “Not how I wanted to start, not super happy, but she saved me a good 190-yard walk,” Smalley said. Chad Ramey (65) and Adam Schenk (68) were 9 under. Schenk also eagled the fourth. He advanced to the weekend for the third time in his last 10 starts. “Just play your game and just worry about yourself,” Schenk said. “I look at handling 18 situations, 18 holes and just handle each situation you get on every hole just to the best of your ability and kind of block out the rest.” Graeme McDowell, the 2019 winner, was 8 under after his second 68. He birdied four of his last five holes. “Key finish to get my momentum back moving into the weekend,” McDowell said. “Continuing to feel very comfortable, like the way the greens are setting up, driving it really well and just got to keep doing more of the same really.” Nate Lashley was 7 under after a 68. Nicolai Hojgaard of Denmark, the highest-ranked player in the field at No. 77 in the world, missed the cut by a stroke with rounds of 73 and 71. His twin brother, Rasmus, was 4 under after a 67. The tournament is being played opposite the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play event in Austin, Texas. The winner will be exempt into the PGA Championship. Defending champion Joel Dahmen withdrew because of illness. He opened with a 71.

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Ed Cooley listens to One Shining Moment before every single gameEd Cooley listens to One Shining Moment before every single game

March 25, 2022March 25, 2022| 23:00

We are 10 days away from this year’s edition of One Shining Moment, but for Providence head coach Ed Cooley, that song is on repeat year-round. Our Confidential Crew drove around Providence this week with Cooley as he prepared for his very first Sweet 16, and there’s no question that song means even more to him right now.

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Everybody on the Bland-wagon – Richard Bland oldest to emerge from pool play at WGC-Dell Technologies Match PlayEverybody on the Bland-wagon – Richard Bland oldest to emerge from pool play at WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play

March 25, 2022March 25, 2022| 19:00

AUSTIN, Texas – Golf has a way of returning to a man, again and again. RELATED: Scores, bracket, tee times | Recaps from Day 3 | Richard Bland explains wild equipment setup, including a 5-wood from 2010 Richard Bland, who got his first win in his 478th start on the DP World Tour last year, and is currently peaking at 49, could tell you all about it. And he knows his late-in-the-game rise has reverberated far beyond the yellow, nylon gallery ropes. “Yeah, obviously the messages that I get from people that, all over the globe, over the last 12 months, has been incredible,” Bland said after beating Lee Westwood 2 and 1 at the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play on Friday. “People that you never will ever meet, and they tell me their kind of story that what I’ve done has inspired them to carry on their journey. They were losing a little bit of hope, and am I going down right path, and it’s given them that extra sort of belief that they are on the right path. “And that’s – reading them is quite emotional,” Bland continued. “I will always keep them. Whenever this phone gets sort of upgraded or whatever, all those messages will stay forever.” Bland has a lot of silver in his 5 o’clock shadow, but who gets to say when it’s finally too late? In a sense, the action Friday, as Bland dispatched his old English boys’ teammate Westwood to set up a knockout-round match against Dustin Johnson, was a microcosm of Bland’s whole career. That is, things looked shaky – until they didn’t. But that’s golf. It serves up the same shot that just left a bad taste, the same tournament that slipped away last year, until a man either gets it right or quits. It was slipping away as Bland missed putts of 7 feet and 9 feet at the 13th and 15th holes, respectively, allowing Westwood to close the gap. Finally, though, when he could afford no more lapses, Bland coaxed in an 8-foot birdie putt on 16 to preserve a 1-up lead. Then he drained a 32-foot birdie on 17 to defeat Westwood 2 and 1 and advance. A moth flitted just above the ball as it made its way to the hole on the decisive putt, and when it dropped, golf’s most unlikely new Cinderella pumped his fist – Bland fury! – and waited for Westwood to line up his own birdie try from 21 feet. It slid by. Bland, who got an exemption into next week’s Valero Texas Open and is trying to play his way into the world top 50 and his first Masters in two weeks (he’s 60th), was moving on. He is the oldest player to win his group since this format began in 2015, topping Phil Mickelson, who was 46 when he advanced to the knockout rounds in 2017. The new darling of Austin, Bland has increasingly enviable problems. He and his wife, Catrin, were supposed to be headed to New York to celebrate her 40th birthday, but that will have to wait. She’s flying from England to Austin and is expected to be here by Saturday night. They will be in San Antonio for the Valero next week, and possibly Augusta, Georgia, after that. Bland’s life has utterly transformed since his playoff win at the Betfred British Masters last year. Since then, he’s had a share of the lead through two rounds at the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines (fading to finish T50) and lost in a playoff to Viktor Hovland at the Dubai Desert Classic in January. More than two decades into his career, he is, somewhat inexplicably, peaking. He’s getting into tournaments, like this one, that once went on without him. How to explain it? He has no idea. “I’m not doing anything different,” he said. He still uses the same mismatched set of clubs, some of them a decade old. He still has the same coach, and still laces up his boots and puts his head down and just gets on with it. Success, though, has finally gotten in the way. “I guess probably someone at 49 shouldn’t be doing this for the first time,” he said. But in the next breath he says if a man stays fit and takes care of himself, why not? “Never,” he said, when asked if he’d doubted himself. “Even when I lost my card in 2018, I always kind of thought one year doesn’t make you a bad player, you don’t become a bad player overnight. Not when you’ve played on the European Tour for 15 plus years. So yeah, I knew what was in front of me going back to the Challenge Tour at 46 years old.” When was the last time Bland hit a 400-plus-yard drive, like Johnson, his next opponent? “Probably never,” Bland said, “but it’s going to be fun. Of course, he’s favorite. Yeah, I’m not, that’s not being negative or anything like that. That’s just realistic. Everybody knows that. “But if I play how I know I can play,” he added, “I would like to think he’s got a game on his hands.” Counting Bland’s Irish caddie, Greg Milne, and his caddie’s kid brother, Rory, who plays college golf in Louisiana, there were four people on the Bland-wagon for this rousing run. The other two: Bland’s brother, Heath, who nearly died from a virus in 2018 and has come all the way back, and his brother’s best friend, Tim. Golf has returned to Bland; life itself has returned to his brother. To mark Heath’s incredible recovery – “He died twice,” Bland said – the brothers were supposed to play Augusta National in 2020. Like so much else during the worst of the pandemic, the trip got canceled. They were supposed to play again this week. That, too, got canceled when Bland did enough to punch his ticket to Austin. “That’s my bad, that one,” he said, laughing. Bland also laughed at the vagaries of the Official World Golf Ranking. “I didn’t play for three weeks, and I think I went up seven spots,” he said. “So, I was kind of thinking, well, if I don’t play for the rest of the year, I might be world No. 1.” The line got a big reaction, but why not? Less than a year shy of PGA TOUR Champions eligibility, Bland is on the kind of rise that would confound even TopTracer. He never lost hope, he’s going down the right path, and whether or not it gets him to Augusta, the other guys have got a game on their hands.

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Match recaps from Friday: WGC-Dell Technologies Match PlayMatch recaps from Friday: WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play

March 25, 2022March 25, 2022| 18:47

The World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play is back. Friday’s third round is the third of three days of group play. After Friday, the player with the best record in each of the 16 four-man pools will advance to knockout play (ties of two or more players will be broken via sudden-death playoff). Two rounds apiece will be played Saturday and Sunday to crown a champion. This is the only PGA TOUR event where players go mano-a-mano, and Austin Country Club is a perfect site for this format thanks to its offering of risk-reward holes. Upon the conclusion on Friday’s 32 matches and any sudden-death playoffs, 16 players will advance to weekend competition, where knockout play will commence Saturday morning in the Round of 16. As each group concludes its competition, this file will be updated to keep you apprised of the action from the TOUR’s only match play event. Return here often to learn about the latest upsets, comebacks and nail-biting finishes. FRIDAY RECAPS (Click here for live scores) (Click here for scenarios into Friday) GROUP 5 SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER (2-1-0) def. MATT FITZPATRICK (2-1-0), 5 and 4 Scheffler, a Match Play finalist in his debut a year ago, needed to win to stay alive in his group and got off to the ideal start, jumping out to a 3-up advantage after six holes. He nearly aced the par-3 fourth (3 feet) and won the sixth when Fitzpatrick tugged a drive left, next to an out-of-bounds fence. He scrambled for par, but Scheffler got up-and-down for birdie. A key turnabout came at the ninth: Fitzpatrick hit his approach to 11 feet, looking to cut into Scheffler’s 3-up lead. Scheffler was 29 feet away, facing a downhill, right-to-left putt. He rolled it in, and Fitzpatrick missed, Scheffler stretching his cushion to 4 up. Scheffler ended the match with birdies at the 13th and 14th holes. Both players finished group play at 2-1-0. Scheffler: “I didn’t really make any mistakes. I took advantage of a few mistakes he made early. He got a really bad break on our second hole (which Scheffler won with a par), and after that I started cruising and played some good golf. NOTE: A playoff between Fitzpatrick and Scheffler to decide a Group 5 winner is pending. IAN POULTER (1-2-0) def. TOMMY FLEETWOOD (1-2-0), 4 and 3 After two opening losses, match play’s Postman (he always delivers) broke through on Friday, making sure he did not exit Austin without at least one match victory. Poulter defeated his fellow Englishman pretty handily, never trailing in the match. Leading 1 up through four holes, Poulter went on a bit of a tear, starting the run with a pitch-in for eagle from behind the front right bunker at the 342-yard fifth hole. He birdied the par-5 sixth, won the eighth with a par, and when he rolled in a 16-foot birdie at the ninth, he was 4 up. Fleetwood made a nice birdie at the par-3 11th, but it was just a matter of time until Poulter closed the match out. He did so with his sixth consecutive par, winning the 15th hole. Poulter is 33-19-0 in his career at the Match Play, defeating Paul Casey for the title in 2010. GROUP 12 BILLY HORSCHEL ADVANCES BILLY HORSCHEL (2-0-1) tied THOMAS PIETERS (1-1-1) The first match out on the day and it was beautifully played from beginning to end. Yet Pieters walked off the 18th green heated, even though he made five birdies and no bogeys during the epic duel. That’s because Pieters was 2 up with two holes remaining and Horschel, who made six birdies in the match, made birdies on 17 and 18 to win the holes and tie the match overall. On the 17th green, Pieters had already made par and Horschel was standing over a birdie putt from 13 feet. He needed to make, or he’d have lost the match and would’ve been heading to a playoff to determine who would advance from the group. But the defending WGC-Dell Match Play champion calmly poured in the putt, then got up and down for birdie from 30 yards short of the 18th green, won the hole, tied the match and is moving on. Pieters missed a birdie attempt from outside 6 feet on the last hole that would’ve given him the victory. Pieters was 2 up after three holes and made birdies on the second, third and fourth holes. Horschel tied the match after birdie on the ninth hole, then Pieters went to 1-up on 13 when Horschel drove the ball into the water. Birdie on the par-5 16th from Pieters gave him the 2-up advantage before Horschel closed with the heroic finish to be able to continue his Match Play title defense. “I hung in there,” Horschel said. “I hit some really quality shots. Some of them didn’t turn out. I made some putts, which was nice to see. Being 2 down with two to go and knowing all I needed was a half to move on to Round of 16, that’s a real confidence boost to birdie the last two to get through.” TOM HOGE (0-2-1) tied MIN WOO LEE (1-1-1) Hoge was already eliminated before the match but still gave it a valiant effort, making birdie on the last hole to squeeze out a tie after being winless in his previous two matches. Hoge, who told reporters earlier in the week that he hadn’t played in a competitive match play event for 11 years, jumped out to an early 1-up lead, but Lee was 1 up at the turn. Lee went 2 up with a birdie on the 12th hole, but Hoge won the 13th with a par. Lee remained 1 up until the final hole, where he made a mess of it and drove it wildly left off the tee. That allowed Hoge to cruise, blasting a 342-yard drive and hit an approach to 7 feet to win the hole and tie the match. Lee had a chance to advance to the Round of 16 before the match started, but when Billy Horschel birdied the last two holes to tie his match against Thomas Pieters, Lee was officially eliminated before his match with Hoge ended. GROUP 13 SI WOO KIM (2-1-0) def. CHRISTIAAN BEZUIDENHOUT (0-3-0), 6 and 4 This match was lopsided from the opening tee shot and Kim was 5 up after seven holes. Bezuidenhout was eliminated before the match even started and didn’t put up much of a fight. He conceded the first hole, then Kim birdied the fourth, sixth and seventh holes, eagled the fifth hole and the match was quickly out of hand. Bezuidenhout made birdie on the 11th to cut into the lead, but Kim birdied No. 12 to move back to 5 up and then closed the match out on the 14th hole, not needing to play the final four. Bezuidenhout was winless on the week. With the match being over so quickly, Kim had to sit and wait to learn his fate. If Daniel Berger defeats Tyrrell Hatton, there will be a three-man playoff between Kim, Berger and Hatton. If Hatton wins or ties his match with Berger, Hatton advances.

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