It really wasn’t even the score: a second-round, 6-under 66 that was 10 shots better than his sloppy start to the week at the Zozo Championship.
If Tiger Woods is being honest at this juncture in his unparalleled career, success isn’t measured on the scorecard so much as it is with the unquantifiable minutia.
This week, for example, was a chance for Woods to defend a PGA Tour title for the first time since 2014 on a course that he has owned. In a decade of Hero World Challenges played at Sherwood Country Club, Woods never finished outside the top 2, and after matching Sam Snead’s mark of 82 Tour titles at least year’s Zozo Championship, this would, on paper, check all the boxes for potential success.
But this is a different Tiger.
He wants to win and, yes, second still sucks. But in the grand scheme of life imitating art, he’ll take progress.
Like the rest of us, 2020 hasn’t been kind to Woods. He has just a single top-10 finish this year, and that came way back in January at Torrey Pines. Woods has played just five events since the pandemic restart in June. So, while Thursday’s 4-over card wasn’t where he’d hoped to be, understand that the number was only a part of the equation.
Tiger (66): ‘Hit the ball so much better’ than opening 76
That progress came on Friday. He birdied three consecutive holes starting at No. 4, bounced back with another at No. 11 and played his last three holes in 2 under. Although he finished the day right where he started, a dozen shots off the lead, he had something to build on.
“It just snowballed into a high number [on Thursday]. I was never really able to get any kind of momentum going because I played the par 5s so poorly. Today was different,” Woods said. “Got off to a much better start and kept rolling.”
That’s the minutia. After playing Sherwood’s five par-5s in 3 over on Thursday, Woods was a more respectable 4 under on Day 2. It’s always more complicated than it appears, but for Tiger, the two-day turnaround can largely be traced to his play off the tee.
He was more accurate. He was more aggressive. He was more capable of working the ball in both directions.
The latter is worth noting, especially with the Masters looming three weeks away. Unless Woods makes a dramatic schedule change and adds the Houston Open to his dance card – something he’s flirting with at least publicly – this will be his final tune-up before the year’s final major. It was an 11th-hour epiphany that propelled him to victory at last year’s Masters and allowed him to start moving the ball from right to left more consistently.
“I feel like I’m able to draw the ball a little bit better. And I need to get a little bit more sharp with it, start setting up a little bit higher than I am right now,” Woods said. “There are a couple holes that I do like setting it up and hitting high draws and I’ve done that. At Augusta I’m going to have to do that a lot more often than I am here.”
It would be an unspoken party foul for Woods, or any other player, to outright call another Tour event a tune-up for the Masters, but in this case, it is. A dozen strokes back on a course built for speed and birdies, there’s little chance of Woods collecting No. 83 this week.
But with the Grand Slam jewel awaiting, he can ready his game. He can practice that high draw and envision how it would play on, say, the 10th hole at Augusta National.
“No. 6 [at Sherwood] is a lot like No. 10, setting up, trying to hit that high tomahawk draw down there, I was able to do it yesterday and today,” he said. “So yes, there are a couple shots that yeah, I do look at that are similar to what I’m going to face at Augusta. I’ve got a few weeks out, so yes, imaging some of those shots already, and I have been for quite a while, ever since the U.S. Open.”
Forgive Woods for not being overly excited after his bounce-back, 6-under round. It’s the high draw off the sixth tee and a back that looked impressively lithe on Friday that he cares about at this juncture.
“I am moving a lot better. Having four weeks off was good, training sessions have been good, so everything’s kind of turned around,” he said.
Tiger was pleased with his game and his score on Day 2, but it was his progress that made him smile.
EDMONTON – The Edmonton Oilers signed defenceman Travis Dermott to a professional tryout on Friday.
Dermott, a 27-year-old from Newmarket, Ont., produced two goals, five assists and 26 penalty minutes in 50 games with the Arizona Coyotes last season.
The six-foot, 202-pound blueliner has also played for the Vancouver Canucks and Toronto Maple Leafs.
Toronto drafted him in the second round, 34th overall, of the 2015 NHL draft.
Over seven NHL seasons, Dermott has 16 goals and 46 assists in 329 games while averaging 16:03 in ice time.
Before the NHL, Dermott played two seasons with Oilers captain Connor McDavid for the Ontario Hockey League’s Erie Otters. The team was coached by current Edmonton head coach Kris Knoblauch.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
NEWPORT, R.I. (AP) — Maria Sharapova, a five-time Grand Slam singles champion, led the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s fan vote her first year on the ballot — an important part to possible selection to the hall’s next class.
The organization released the voting results on Friday. American doubles team Bob and Mike Bryan finished second with Canada’s Daniel Nestor third.
The Hall of Fame said tens of thousands of fans from 120 countries cast ballots. Fan voting is one of two steps in the hall’s selection process. The second is an official group of journalists, historians, and Hall of Famers from the sport who vote on the ballot for the hall’s class of 2025.
“I am incredibly grateful to the fans all around the world who supported me during the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s fan votes,” Sharapova said in a statement. “It is a tremendous honor to be considered for the Hall of Fame, and having the fans’ support makes it all the more special.”
Sharapova became the first Russian woman to reach No. 1 in the world. She won Wimbledon in 2004, the U.S. Open in 2006 and the Australian Open in 2008. She also won the French Open twice, in 2012 and 2014.
Sharapova was also part of Russia’s championship Fed Cup team in 2008 and won a silver medal at the London Olympics in 2012.
To make the hall, candidates must receive 75% or higher on combined results of the official voting group and additional percentage from the fan vote. Sharapova will have an additional three percentage points from winning the fan vote.
The Bryans, who won 16 Grand Slam doubles titles, will have two additional percentage points and Nestor, who won eight Grand Slam doubles titles, will get one extra percentage point.
The hall’s next class will be announced late next month.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The driver charged with killing NHL hockey player Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew as they bicycled on a rural road had a blood-alcohol level of .087, above the .08 legal limit in New Jersey, a prosecutor said Friday.
Gaudreau, 31, and brother Matthew, 29, were killed in Carneys Point, New Jersey, on Aug. 29, the evening before they were set to serve as groomsmen at their sister Katie’s wedding.
The driver, 43-year-old Sean M. Higgins of nearby Woodstown, New Jersey, is charged with two counts of death by auto, along with reckless driving, possession of an open container and consuming alcohol in a motor vehicle. At a virtual court hearing Friday, a judge ordered that he be held for trial after prosecutors described a history of alleged road rage and aggressive driving.
“’You were probably driving like a nut like I always tell you you do. And you don’t listen to me, instead you just yell at me,’” his wife told Higgins when he called her from jail after his arrest, according to First Assistant Prosecutor Jonathan Flynn of Salem County.
The defense described Higgins as a married father and law-abiding citizen before the crash.
“He’s an empathetic individual and he’s a loving father of two daughters,” said defense lawyer Matthew Portella. “He’s a good person and he made a horrible decision that night.”
Higgins told police he had five or six beers that day and admitted to consuming alcohol while driving, according to the criminal complaint. He also failed a field sobriety test, the complaint said. A prosecutor on Friday said he had been drinking at home after finishing a work call at about 3 p.m., and having an upsetting conversation with his mother about a family matter.
He then had a two-hour phone call with a friend while he drove around in his Jeep with an open container, Flynn said. He had been driving aggressively behind a sedan going just above the 50 mph speed limit, sometimes tailgating, the female driver told police.
When she and the vehicle ahead of her slowed down and veered left to go around the cyclists, Higgins sped up and veered right, striking the Gaudreas, the two other drivers told police.
“He indicated he didn’t even see them,” said Superior Court Judge Michael J. Silvanio, who said Higgins’ admitted “impatience” caused two deaths.
Higgins faces up to 20 years, a sentence that the judge said made him a flight risk.
Higgins has a master’s degree, works in finance for an addiction treatment company, and served in combat in Iraq, his lawyers said. However, his wife said he had been drinking regularly since working from home, Flynn said.
Johnny Gaudreau, known as “Johnny Hockey,” played 10 full seasons in the league and was set to enter his third with the Columbus Blue Jackets after signing a seven-year, $68 million deal in 2022. He played his first eight seasons with the Calgary Flames, a tenure that included becoming one of the sport’s top players and a fan favorite across North America.
Widows Meredith and Madeline Gaudreau described their husbands as attached at the hip throughout their lives. Both women are expecting, and both gave moving eulogies at the double funeral on Monday.
