Players to Orrick, Player of Year to Malm

    Writing from Galena, Illinois
    Tuesday, October 9, 2012

    The winds were capricious at Eagle Ridge Resort and Spa on Tuesday, but Steve Orrick had been there and done that.
    “It was about the same wind today as yesterday,” Orrick said after his 3-under-par 69 brought him a total of 4-under 140 and a two-stroke victory in the Illinois PGA Players Championship. “It was a good club to club-and-a-half wind, and it shifted from with you to against you. You had to time your shot.”
    Orrick’s timing was perfect, with three birdies on the inward nine of Eagle Ridge’s North Course to overhaul runner-ups Garrett Chaussard and Travis Johns, from Cog Hill and Twin Lakes, respectively. That finished a 2-under 142, Chaussard via a second-round of 4-under 68, Johns with a 69.
    It was Orrick’s third Players Championship title in five seasons, and his second Illinois major of the year. He won the Illinois PGA at Stonewall Orchard in August.
    “A good year,” said Orrick, head professional at the Country Club of Decatur.
    Better than that. There are only four majors open to state pros each season. Orrick didn’t play in the IPGA’s Match Play, which comes in May, and missed the cut in the Illinois Open.
    Orrick, 35, did everything but win the Player of the Year title by winning on Tuesday. That ended up in the steady hands of Curtis Malm, an assistant pro at St. Charles Country Club who had already locked up the Assistant Player of the Year crown. He’s the third to win both in a season.
    “Curtis was just a little better than me,” Orrick said.
    Malm was also better that Johns, who needed to win the Players and an 18-hole stroke play tournament at Schaumburg Golf Club to capture the title, given Malm’s tie for sixth. Malm first burst on the scene by winning the 2000 Illinois Open as an amateur at Royal Fox Country Club, but much has changed since then.
    “Now I’m more consistent,” Malm said.
    That showed in his finishes in this year’s majors. He opened the season by winning the Match Play, was fifth in the Illinois Open, and second in the Illinois PGA before his aggregate of 3-over 147 knotted him with Mike Haase of northwest suburban Boone Creek Golf Course for sixth. (Glen Oak’s Matt Slowinski was fifth, at 2-over 146.)
    “To win the Player of the Year, you have to win one major,” Malm figured.
    It worked for him.
    
    Around Eagle Ridge

    Katie Dick’s day was made when she aced the 13th hole, a 144-yard venture from her tee. Alas, because of the elevation change, the Bryn Mawr assistant didn’t see it roll up to the edge of the hole, and then tumble in. The group ahead, Chris Gumbach, Jim Marinelli and Alex Praeger, gave her the play-by-play when she arrived at the green. ... Orrick cashed a check for $1,600, much of the purse put up by Harris Golf Cars.
    – Tim Cronin

Europe keeps the Cup, stunning Americans

    Writing from Medinah, Illinois
    Sunday, September 30, 2012

    Now we know what Medinah translates to in Arabic: Brookline.
    In a comeback even more improbable than the American rally at The Country Club in 1999, Europe stormed back to capture the 39th Ryder Cup Match, their hard-won 14 1/2-13 1/2 victory the result of an astonishing 8 1/2-3 1/2 takedown of the United States team in Sunday’s sensational singles session at Medinah Country Club.
    It began with Rory McIlroy almost missing his tee time and ended with the many Europeans in the gallery of perhaps 50,000 singing, “Ole! Ole! Ole!” And everywhere a European player went, the spirit of Seve Ballesteros followed.
    “Seve, Seve, Seve, Seve, Seve,” said Justin Rose in the minutes after Martin Kaymer – yes, Martin Kaymer, who had the poorest recent record of any player coming into Medinah – provided the winning point with a 1-up comeback victory over Steve Stricker.
    The biggest road comeback in Ryder Cup history was built on five straight singles wins at the front of the order. Leadoff man Luke Donald, Ian Poulter, McIlroy – who brought a new meaning to breakfast ball as he munched on a granola bar following his tee shot – Justin Rose and Paul Lawrie won their matches, knocking off Bubba Watson, Webb Simpson, Keegan Bradley, Phil Mickelson and Brandt Snedeker, respectively.
    Down 10-6 at dawn, they silenced the American fans and brought the Europeans – there had to be far more than the advertised 3,000 on hand – to life.
    There was a point, just after Lawrie closed out $11.4 million man Brandt Snedeker, 5 and 3, trimming the U.S. margin to 10-8, when, if matches in progress are counted, the Americans were on the way to a 17-11 romp. It was 3:10 p.m.
    McIlroy outlasted Bradley, 2 and 1. Rose, 1 down to Mickelson with two holes to play, won the 17th and 18th with birdies from 25 and 20 feet, respectively, for a 1 up victory. It was 3:40 p.m., tied at 11-11 on the big scoreboard, the U.S. still was in position to wrest the Cup, 14 1/2-13 1/2, counting matches in progress, but Mickelson’s loss was a huge swing in momentum.
    Then the Europeans broke serve. If it wasn’t bad enough for U.S. captain Davis Love III to see Mickelson lose the lead and see Bradley fall after they were rested Saturday afternoon to be fresh on Sunday, more sour moments were to come for him.
    Jim Furyk, the veteran who failed to finish at the U.S. Open and at Firestone, frittered away a lead and watched Sergio Garcia win the 17th and 18th with conventional two-putt pars to win 1-up.
    That brought Europe its first lead, 13-12. It was 4:31 p.m., and the visitors were a point away from retaining the Cup with three matches left on the course. Jason Dufner was 1 up on Peter Hanson, Stricker and Kaymer were all square, and Tiger Woods and Francesco Molinari were all square, making it 14-14 counting the three undeclared precincts.
    Dufner held on for a 2-up victory, making it 13-13 with the knotted Stricker-Kaymer and Woods-Molinari matches still to come.
    And presently, Stricker lost the par-3 17th, failing to get up-and-down from the collar on the back of the green while Kaymer two-putted from 40 feet. Europe had another half-point in its pocket. It was 4:53 p.m. Stricker had to win the 18th or the match was over.
    He did not. Even as Woods was in the process of winning the 17th with a par, Stricker was managing to lose the last. His approach stopped 40 feet from the cup on the back shelf. Kaymer’s approach stopped 20 feet away.
    Stricker surveyed the putt and hit it so far off line, a good eight feet to the left, it was incomprehensible. Kaymer’s 20-footer rolled five feet past the cup. Stricker made his par putt, but Kaymer made his comebacker for par, clinching his match 1 up, and the Ryder Cup with point No. 14.
    It was 5:13 p.m. It was over. The Europeans had won or retained the Cup for the seventh time in the last nine matches.
    “It’s undescribable,” said Kaymer in fractured English. “I was so nervous the last two or three holes. Ollie (captain Jose Maria Olazabal) came up and said, ‘We need the point.’ But I love the feeling.”
    The Europeans thrived under the pressure, and the Americans, especially veterans Mickelson, Furyk and Stricker, wilted. Woods, at least, got a half-point, conceding Molinari a 3-footer for par on the 18th green after he missed a par putt himself. That made the final margin 14 1/2-13 1/2.
    And a comeback unlike another other in the history of the quest for that little gold trophy was complete. The numbers were the same as at The Country Club, but the circumstances – on the road, underappreciated, and so yawn – were different.
    “I knew it was difficult, but I truly believed we could do it,” Olazabal said. “And Seve? I think he’s proud.”
    The Europeans had a silhouette of Ballesteros on their golf bags and his heart on their minds all weekend. Thanks to skywriters, his name was often inscribed across the Technicolor blue sky the last two days.
    It can fairly be said that the revival started Saturday afternoon, when the U.S. lost two of the four best-ball matches. Had the Woods-Stricker duo beaten Garcia-Donald, and had Dufner-Zach Johnson not lost a 2-up lead and the match to McIlroy-Poulter, the Europeans’ Sunday mountain would have been even steeper.
    “We wanted to believe,” Poulter told the BBC on the 18th green as cheers abounded from all around. “We were not under any illusions of how easy it would be. But last (Saturday) night, the team room was amazing. We weren’t four down. We were even.”
    Said Chicago European Luke Donald, “We believed in ourselves.”
    The opening five matches laid the groundwork.
    Donald never trailed Bubba Watson. The American bomber, again swinging with the crowd cheering, missed the first fairway, lost the second hole, and never had a chance, not with Donald hitting 11 fairways and scoring 4-under for 17 holes.
    A day after his garrison finish, Poulter came from 2-down to skunk Simpson, winning the last two holes.
    McIlroy, who mixed his time zones and arrived in a police car – “At least I wasn’t in the back,” he quipped – 10 minutes before his tee time, emulated Walter Hagen and was 2-up on Simpson after an hour. Bradley squared the match by parring the 12th, but McIlroy birdied the 14th from 4 feet and the 15th from 3 feet to go 2 up, where the margin stayed.
    Rose was square or ahead of Mickelson until the lefthander birdied the par-5 14th from 4 feet – even as Poulter was in his downswing some 60 yards away on the 16th. But Rose’s bomb on the 17th squared the match and his heroics on the 18th won it.
    “The last three holes, I thought I had the match,” Mickelson said. “He played phenomenal there.”
    Before all those decisions were handed down, Lawrie was punching out Snedeker, whose Tour Championship and FedEx Cup titles last Sunday at East Lake Golf Club netted him $11.4 million. His failure to knock off Lawrie was a surprise, especially to Love.
    “We put our hot players out front, and our steady players in the back,” Love said. “We just missed a couple points in the middle.”
    Snedeker’s was one. Stricker’s in the 11th spot in the lineup was another.
    “When we saw the singles draw, we saw a lot of matches we could win,” McDowell said. “We got things right today with the order.”
    Lawrie had been blanked on Friday and Saturday. That was motivation for Sunday.
    “You put everything into this,” Lawrie said. “We were all so keen to put a point on the board. If I’d come away with no points and we lost, I’d be gutted. But to play 6-under-par (including an eagle to win the par-4 fifth hole when Snedeker birdied) and put a point on the board, I’m chuffed.”
    So were they all when Kaymer’s 5-footer rolled home. Fans wearing the European flag around their shoulders danced on the hill behind the 16th green, the “Ole! Ole! Ole!” song could be heard at Woodfield, and, within minutes, McIlroy, Rose and Poulter were singing while hopping about the 18th green.
    Minutes later, the European team was on the bridge between the putting green and first tee, huge bottles of Moet in hand, doing their best Dan Gurney impression by spraying the gallery with Champagne. It was the first time in Medinah history – well, at least since the first years of the club, which coincided with the Roaring ’20s, that one could walk through the bubbly on the grounds.
    “Beers and tears will be the order of the night,” McDowell said.
    For both teams.
    – Tim Cronin

Will Americans' Cup runneth over?

    Writing from Medinah, Illinois
    Saturday, September 29, 2012

    Not even Duke Ellington could explain Saturday at the 39th Ryder Cup Match.
    This was more than golf beyond category. This was sport on the grandest of stages played with the most fervent of emotions. Alabama-Auburn, move over.
    And to think that David Duval once called the Ryder Cup a “glorified exhibition.”
    Maybe he never met Ian Poulter. Or Keegan Bradley. Or Phil Mickelson. Or Luke Donald.
    Duval knows at least three of the four – Bradley was just out of diapers when Duval had a cup of divots as No. 1 in the world. They get it. But he never got it.
    Everyone else is getting it. The 45,000-plus on hand over Medinah Country Club’s now-dusty No. 3 course really get it.
    Saturday featured everything from players driving to cheers off the first tee – Bubba Watson, hello! – to skywriting with snark floating over Medinah’s bright blue skies supplied by a marketing group from Wales, complete with “Has anyone seen Tiger?”
    Look! There’s Webb Simpson making four straight birdies and seven in 10 holes.
    Look! There’s Poulter making birdies on the last five holes to wrest a vital point from the U.S.
    Look! There’s “Keegleson,” the dynamic duo of Bradley and Mickelson, trouncing Lee Westwood and Donald in the morning, a 7 and 6 rout that matched the Ryder Cup record for 18-hole team matches.
    Look! There’s Woods with five birdies on the back nine for the second afternoon running.
    Yes, Tiger was very much seen. He slept in, having not been assigned to a morning match, then woke up the echoes, playing like the Tiger of old rather than an old Tiger.
    Everyone saw him on the back nine post meridian. That barrage of birdies scared the wits out of Luke Donald and Sergio Garcia, but for a third time in as many matches, he and teammate Steve Stricker failed to earn a point. Donald, Northwestern’s very own, was like a wildcat with three birdies in the last five holes, including a three-footer for a deuce after the best tee shot on the treacherous par-3 17th.
    The failure of Woods and Stricker to convert was about all that went wrong for the Americans. A 3-1 romp in the morning’s alternate shot competition, followed by a 2-2 split in the afternoon best-ball showdowns, earned the U.S. dynamic dozen a 10-6 advantage entering Sunday’s singles showcase.
    Lest it be forgotten, this is not an insurmountable lead. Thirteen years ago, the Americans trailed by as much at The Country Club, Ben Crenshaw said, “I’ve got a feeling” on Saturday night, and the Europeans felt it on Sunday. It remains the greatest rally in Ryder Cup history.
    Now, Europe has to duplicate it, and on the road. And with Martin Kaymer, Peter Hanson and Francesco Molinari in the lineup. It won’t be easy.
    “Tomorrow is going to be a big day,” European captain Jose Maria Olazabal said.
    He meant for his side.
    “At one point in this match, I believe that momentum will come our way, and why not tomorrow?” Olazabal said.
    There are no other options on the calendar. That’s why Olazabal front-loaded his lineup, opening with Donald, Poulter and Rory McIlroy. Davis Love III, the best captain in Chicago since Chris Chelios, opens with Watson, Simpson and Bradley. That’s the current Masters champion, U.S. Open champion, and the 2011 PGA Championship winner, who goes up against this year’s PGA winner.
    Then Love has Phil Mickelson and Brandt Snedeker. Olazabal has Justin Rose and Paul Lawrie.
    This is what is known as American depth.
    “I wouldn’t want to play anybody on our side,” Love said.
    Europe had trailed on all four matches in the morning, and in three of the four in the afternoon, but garnered just enough points to stay in the game if the 1999 formula is followed.
    “It’s given us a heartbeat for tomorrow,” Donald said.
    “We obviously need to play amazing and win at least eight points, but I’d rather have to win eight points than 10,” Garcia said. “We’re going to give it our best shot.”
    Poulter’s rousing finish, eyes wide after he sank birdie putts on the last five holes, was astonishing. He hadn’t played in Friday’s best-ball matches – Olazabal may come to regret that – but went insane at the end. A birdie on the par-5 14th matched Jason Dufner. A chip to gimmie range on the 15th squared the match. A curling 16-footer on the par-4 16th moved he and McIlroy 1 up. A 9-footer on the par-3 17th was matched by Zach Johnson’s 3-footer for a deuce.
    Then, with the sun having set and the light quickly failing, Poulter his his 159-yard approach to 10 feet and rolled the birdie putt home, on top of Dufner’s 3 1/2 footer, for matching 3s and 1 up victory, and a 10-5 margin in the Americans’ favor, rather than 11-5.
    “It was an outside right putt, and she went in,” Poulter said.
    “I thought he pushed it,” McIlroy kidded.
    This festival of shotmaking and putting on surfaces made of green marble made for incredible theater, and with a minimum of catcalls until the late going, when the liquor started talking. Sunday, the gates open four hours before Watson and Donald commence firing. That’s a lot of time to buy beer.
    Every time you looked around on Saturday, there were amazing sights. Even when you looked up. Who expected skywriters? But there they were, five planes jotting out pro-European team comments, from a touching “Do it for Seve” at the start to “Fore! Tiger’s back; Go Team Nordegren” in the afternoon. (Woods, incidentally, ran his spectators hit record to three on Saturday, a tee shot on No. 7 hitting a lady. He gave her a glove and a hug, along with his regrets.)
    It’s rather stunning that he and Stricker haven’t at least grabbed a halve along the way. Woods    has birdied 34.3 percent of the holes he’s played on his own ball. According to stat guru Jason Sobel, Woods birdied 27.3 percent of the time in 2000, when he began his Grand Slam run.
    Sunday’s pairings finish with Woods against Molinari. Woods against one player? He should be able to handle that. And he may not have to.
    No matter what, it will be loud on Sunday. At least from the spectators – with U.S. fans asked to wear red like a certain player – this will be the Indianapolis 500 on a golf course. Gentlemen, start your drivers.
    – Tim Cronin

U.S. up 8-4 after Saturday morning

    Writing from Medinah, Illinois
    Saturday, September 29, 2012

    They’re known as Keegelson now, Phil Mickelson and Keegan Bradley.
    And they’re the best couple on the course since Danny Noonan and Maggie the waitress.
    All this hugs-and-high fives duo did Saturday morning at Medinah Country Club is dust Lee Westwood and Luke Donald 7 and 6 in the alternate shot competition, known officially as “foursomes.”
    Seven and 6? That’s like an election in the 11th Ward. It’s no contest, and tied a Ryder Cup record for margin in an 18-hole team match.
    So how can American captain Davis Love III not play them again in the afternoon best-ball match? They’re 3-0, and account for 37.5 percent of America’s points through three of the five sessions in the 39th Ryder Cup Match.
    Keegleson – the nickname is courtesy of Golf Channel commentator Kelly Tilghman – combined for six birdies in the first 10 holes, building a 6-up lead. When Westwood and Donald bollixed up the par-4 12th, it was over, and the thousands encamped at the hole roared like they hadn’t roared all morning.
    Well, maybe it was as loud at the first hole when Ian Poulter and Bubba Watson each teed off with the crowd roaring, bringing the movie “Happy Gilmore” to life. And did so as skywriters flew overhead jotting out “Do it for Seve # Go Europe” and other sayings in the clear blue sky. It was sensory overload, and that was before the Americans held leads in all four matches for a time.
    By the time morning play was over, the U.S. held an 8-4 lead, which is commanding but not insurmountable. The Americans trailed by that margin in 1999 through three sessions and came back to win at The Country Club.
    But back to Keegleson. They got the afternoon off, with Love revealing he didn’t want anyone to play in all five matches, which could have meant as many as 90 holes over three days.
    So afternoon play begins without Keegleson, but with Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker together again for the umpteenth time, playing against Sergio Garcia and Donald. Dustin Johnson and Matt Kuchar are matched with Nicolas Colsaerts and Paul Lawrie, Watson and Webb Simpson are playing Justin Rose and Francesco Molinari, and Jason Dufner and Zach Johnson face Rory McIlroy and Poulter.
    A full report tonight. Check Twitter @illinoisgolfer for updates when we’re not on the course.
    – Tim Cronin

Americans up 5-3 in rollicking Ryder Cup

    Writing from Medinah, Illinois
    Friday, September 28, 2012

    The easy way to explain Friday’s opening day of the 39th Ryder Cup Match is to use all the usual superlatives: dramatic, electric, spellbinding, thrilling, unpredictable, and so forth.
    But that would only cover the first five or six minutes.
    The next way would be to assemble a highlight package of the best shots of the day at Medinah Country Club, but you don’t have that much time, we don’t have that much bandwidth, and this site isn’t NBC.
    So settle for this, the phrase Duke Ellington created when something wowed him: Beyond category.
    That’s what the opening day of the biannual tag-team match was. Beyond category.
    There were birdies, an eagle, shots caromed off tents, holed bunker shots, Bubba Watson smacking a tee shot with the crowd cheering, and even the equivalent of a 10-under-par 62 scored by the one, the only, Nicolas Colsaerts.
    You know. The one from Belgium.
    He was about the only guy among the 24 players who didn’t waffle at some point during the day. Eight birdies and an eagle across 18 holes – yes, he played Medinah’s No. 3 course like everyone else – put him in the pantheon of Ryder Cup rookie sensations.
    A round like that hadn’t been seen in this cauldron of self-induced pressure since never.
    Could be he was oblivious. This is the first time the Ryder Cup has been seen on Belgian television.
    At the least, he was unconscious in doing what he did, holing about 253 feet of birdies – the exaggeration is small, believe it – in the course of the best-ball match he and Lee Westwood, soon to be featured on milk cartons, had against Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker.
    Remember Woods? Remember him at Medinah? Two PGA Championship appearances, two PGA Championship wins.
    He and Stricker, paired morning and afternoon, came away with nothing on Friday. Not even a by-your-leave. They were trumped – the Donald was sitting in the grandstand – 2 and 1 in the morning alternate-shot carnival by Ian Poulter and Justin Rose, then beaten by Colsaerts and, nominally, Westwood in the afternoon. Woods shot the equivalent of 7-under 65, which is the stroke-play course record, and that only got him and Stricker to the 18th hole. They halved the hole and the Europeans won the match.
    Ah, and here’s the rub for the visitors. It was the only match they won in the afternoon. That, and a 2-2 split in the morning alternate shot, when the Americans were expected by many, including this corner, to fold like road maps, put the U.S. ahead by 5-3 entering Saturday’s action.
    This, American captain Davis Love III likes.
    “There was a lot of noise this afternoon,” Love said. “It was kind of quiet in the morning.”
    Except, perhaps, for the clunk of Woods hitting the roof of a tent, the whap of him hitting a fan with a tee shot for the second day running, the rasp of Stricker picking that tee shot out of a bag, and the plink of him caroming a shot off a camera tower to a spot in front of the 15th green. And that was just in the morning. He got his game together in the afternoon, when the genius of Love’s course setup, including rough just a tad deeper than Augusta National’s so-called second cut, came into play.
    The Americans, Woods included, could hit it everywhere and either salvage par or make a birdie. That’s how Phil Mickelson could hook one into the trees on the par-4 12th, yet use his skill and carve a rising slice through two trees, over the mighty oak that guards the green, and still let it land oh so softly on the putting surface and save his par.
    Beats the old USGA chop-out from the rough, no?
    Mickelson and Keegan Bradley are the hottest item since Bogie – no, not bogey – and Bacall. They meshed like a chain link fence and ran away with their morning alternate shot match against Luke Donald and Sergio Garcia, 4 and 3. It was the first loss for either European in “foursomes” after a combined 14-0-1 record. Then Lefty and his acolyte bounced Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell 2 and 1 in the best-ball showcase, with birdies on four of the first five holes.
    Bradley splashed birdies all over the scorecard, and Mickelson finished the match off with a tee shot on the par-3 17th that was stony, a mere 18 inches from the cup. The Europeans took off their caps at that shot, Philly Mick and Bradley hugged so long they should have gotten a room, and the U.S. had another point.
    “I’ve never seen anyone drive the ball as well as Keegan,” Mickelson said. “Alternate shot was my favorite format, because I got to play the next shot. Best-ball, I had to play my own. I love playing with this man.”
    “They’re infatuated with each other,” Bradley’s girlfriend said.
    It’s a big love affair in the American team room at the nonce, even with the news that Woods will sit out Saturday morning’s alternate shot scrap, a first for him in Ryder Cup play.
    The point being, this match was expected to go one way, and it’s leaning another. The American margin is but two points, but a 4-4 split on Saturday means the U.S. will need only 5.5 points – five wins and a tied match out of 12 – to regain Samuel Ryder’s little cup. That’s what made Friday’s fireworks display, featuring everything from Woods forcing the afternoon best-ball match to the 18th with a tee shot to four feet on the 17th to Jason Dufner watching a birdie putt tumble into the cup Danny Noonan style, so important.
    Advantage, U.S.
    “I’m going to make it clear to the boys they have to step it up,” European captain Jose Maria Olazabal said. “They need to play better golf, simple as that.”
    Even Colsaerts, he of the eight birdies and the eagle? Good luck with that.
    “It’s difficult to imagine you’re going to do so well, but that is match play,” Colsaerts said. “You have to hole it because you know the guy is going to hole it on top of you.”
    As on the 17th, where Colsaerts’ 35-foot birdie putt, a curler that crashed into the hole, preceded Woods’ four-footer.
    There was even controversy, Jim Furyk questioning a potential drop for McDowell from a sprinkler head by the second green in the morning. Furyk’s notion was agreed to by the chief referee, a BBC commentator said the Americans might regret “their shenanigans,” but the match went to the 18th before McIlroy and McDowell scored their 1 up victory. They’ll see each other again on Saturday morning.
    At one point on Friday morning, all four matches were being won by Europe. Now, the question is if the Europeans can pull off something close to that. Otherwise, they’ll be training going into Singles Sunday, where the Americans should have the edge. But predictions at this address have a way, like Woods’ tee shots, of going haywire.
    – Tim Cronin