Tuesday, October 7, 2014

    Andy Ruthkoski wants to be the next Carlos Sainz Jr.
    He’s going about it the right way.
    Ruthkoski did today what Sainz did last year. He won the 25th Chicago Open. Ruthkoski collected the centennial version of the title, and $10,000, with a 10-foot birdie putt to beat Casey Pyne on the second hole of a sudden-death playoff at Cantigny Golf in Wheaton.
    Now Ruthkoski wants to emulate Sainz’ next step and gain a PGA Tour card.
    Sainz did that earlier this fall. Ruthkoski will chase a Web.com Tour berth – that’s the PGA Tour’s version of Triple A – in order to do so.
    The money the 31-year-old Michigan native earned for winning will help stake his quest. He’s already played on the Tour on several occasions, including playing in the John Deere Classic after grabbing one of the four spots in Monday qualifying. But he’d like to find his way to a regular berth to chase the weekly pot o’gold.
    For now, he can bask in the spotlight as the Chicago Open champion, on a list with Sarazen and Hogan and Snead, who won the original version when it was on the big circuit.
    “It will be an honor to have my name on that trophy alongside all those guys,” Ruthkoski said.
    He scored 4-under-par 68 to finish at 2-under-par 216, while Pyne, from downstate Bloomington, used a 3-under 69 to match his total. Back-to-back birdies on the 11th and 12th – the second and third on Cantigny’s Lakeside nine – keyed Ruthkoski’s rally. Pyne settled for par on the second playoff hole, the ninth on Lakeside, but Ruthkoski’s 10-footer for a 3 was true.
    A five-man deadlock for third included:
    • Sainz, whose bogeys on the 16th and 18th cost him a second straight title;
    • Ryan Martin of Prestonburg, Ky., who bogeyed the 18th to miss the playoff;
    • Matt Thompson, the 2013 runner-up whose back-nine rally couldn’t make up for a 4-over outward nine;
    • Illinois Open challenger Michael Davan of Hoopeston, whose birdie at the last earned him extra cash;
    • and Illinois men’s golf coach Mike Small, who ran off five straight birdies on the back nine, part of a six-birdie binge across nine holes, only to double-bogey the 16th, his 4-under 68 a stroke more than needed. He had five double-bogeys in three rounds.
    John Callahan of Hinsdale was the low amateur, scoring 72 for 5-over 221.
    – Tim Cronin