Tiger Woods still has a flair for the dramatic.
Just when golf fans had been counting him out, Woods tied Jack Nicklaus with his 73rd PGA Tour victory at the Golden Bear’s tournament, the Memorial, on Sunday. That sets him up for the U.S. Open in two weeks, just as his comeback win at Arnold Palmer’s tourney, the Bay Hill Invitational, seemed to be setting him up for the Masters.
“Boy, I hit it good today,” he said after tying the day’s best round with a 67 to finish 9-under 279, two shots better than Andres Romero and Rory Sabbatini. “That was some good stuff out there. I never really missed a shot. As Sean (Foley, his swing coach) likes to say, ‘Go out there and put on a stripe show,’ and I did. I hit it great.”
Woods started the day four behind Spencer Levin (75), who had coughed up a six-shot lead to Kyle Stanley on the final day at the Waste Management Open in Phoenix in February. Woods served notice with a stellar 33 on the front nine and was within two with four holes to play. He birdied three of them, including an impossible 50-foot chip-in on No. 16 that Nicklaus told him was the best shot he’d ever seen at Muirfield Village.
Woods was above the hole in deep rough, staring at water behind the green.
“If I leave it short, it’s going to roll down to the left,” he explained. “If I hit it long, it’s going to be in the water and the lie wasn’t all that great. That was the hard part.”
Woods accentuated the shot with a trademark underhand fist pump and put the capper on with a final birdie on No. 18, holding his putter aloft with one arm as Nicklaus applauded. It was a remarkable performance, considering he had battled a 102-degree fever the day before and, in his three previous tournaments, had sandwiched two 40th-place finishes at the Masters and Players around a missed cut at the Wells Fargo. But Woods, who has won this event five times, seemed totally comfortable, even more than he was at Bay Hill. Gone, for instance, were the interminable practice swings and indecision. Woods now joins Jason Dufner and Hunter Mahan as the Tour’s only two-time winners this year in tying Nicklaus for second place behind Sam Snead on the all-time wins list.
“To do it at age 36 (10 years younger than Nicklaus at the ’86 Masters) is not too shabby,” he said. “I’ve been very proud of what I’ve done so far and I feel I’ve got a lot of good years ahead of me.”
Of course, his biggest challenge is in matching Nicklaus’ 18 major titles. “I’m excited because of the way I hit the golf ball this week,” he said. “At Olympic (in San Francisco, site of the Open), we’re all going to have to hit the ball great. That golf course, you look at the history of the guys who were in contention or who ended up winning . . . all were wonderful drivers of the golf ball and good solid iron players. That’s what it’s going to take at Olympic.”
