Kuchar defeats nerves, Taylor
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/10/2009 (6146 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
IT had been so long since Matt Kuchar had won on the PGA Tour that a huge case of nerves was a given, especially when faced with a sudden-death playoff.
“I had a hard time falling asleep (Sunday night). My mind was racing,” Kuchar said Monday after defeating Vaughn Taylor on the sixth extra hole of the Turning Stone Resort Championship in Verona, N.Y. “I was extremely nervous.”
“It’s a feeling that you don’t feel very often. It’s exciting to feel it. It really makes you feel alive.”
Kuchar rolled in an 18-inch putt for par for the victory, just his second on tour and first in seven years.
“It’s hard to describe the feeling,” said Kuchar, who missed the cut at Turning Stone two years ago. “They’re so difficult to win. If you don’t win, there’s not a whole lot of rewards.
“The game beats you up.”
Kuchar knows from experience. A heralded amateur player — he was the 1997 U.S. Amateur champion after Tiger Woods’s three-year run — and a star at Georgia Tech, he won the 2002 Honda Classic in his first full season on tour.
That was it until Monday.
“There’s something to be said about guys that win,” Kuchar said as he hugged his young son Cameron and kissed his wife Sybi.
Kuchar improved to 2-0 in playoffs, and the top prize of US$1.08 million boosted his earnings for the year past $2.3 million to 25th on the money list. His best previous finish in a tournament this year was a fifth-place tie at the Memorial in June.
Tied for the lead after 72 holes, neither player managed to win after two playoff holes on Sunday. They each birdied the first extra hole and parred the second before play was suspended because of darkness.
The playoff was staged over two par-5s, the 12th and 18th holes, and the par-4 13th. Kuchar missed a chance to win on the first hole Monday when his short putt lipped out at No. 13 as each player bogeyed the hole.
“There certainly were a lot of nerves on that opening hole,” Kuchar said.
Turning Stone is the first tournament of the Fall Series, which is comprised of five events.
Players are vying to finish the year in the top 125 on the money list to retain full exemption for 2010.
— The Associated Press
