Long time Inbee-tween wins for leader Park

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This article was published 24/06/2012 (5170 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

WATERLOO, Ont. — Inbee Park’s birdie on the 18th hole gave the South Korean a little breathing room with a two-shot lead on Saturday heading into the final round at the Manulife Financial LPGA Classic.

Ahead by one shot over countrywoman Hee Kyung Seo going into the last hole at Grey Silo Golf Course, the 23-year-old padded her lead with a third round score of 5-under par 66 to sit 14 under for the tournament.

Seo and American Brittany Lang both went 4-under on the day to tie for second at 12 under par.

“I think I played par 5s really good today; that helped me out a lot,” said Park. “There were some more putts out there that I could have made, but I was really happy with the way I hit the ball today and hopefully tomorrow it will be a better putting day.”

If Park can hang on to the lead today, it will be her first victory on the tour since she became the youngest player to win the U.S. Open at 19 years, 11 months and 17 days.

“I haven’t had a win for a while so it will be nice to win tomorrow,” said Park. “But I’ll just go out there, just play like today with no expectations. Just play like a normal day.”

Lang became a surprise contender for the final round after she birdied the 16 and 17th hole, and eagled the 18th after 15 straight pars to start her round.

“I hit some good putts and some good shots, but I just couldn’t get anything going. I stayed patient and positive and finally hit the birdie on 16 and got some energy,” she said.

“It’s tricky to read the greens out here. You can hit good putts and not make them. But I stayed positive and hit two awesome shots on 18. I’m very happy with that finish.”

Should Lang win the tournament, she’ll be the first of 16 Duke University Blue Devils — a dynasty in women’s collegiate golf — that played on the LPGA tour to have a victory.

“That still blows my mind every time I hear it,” said Lang. “It would be so cool. I mean, I like to represent my family and my hometown as well, but to do that, that would be amazing.”

Of course, Seo will have something to say about that. Last season’s Rolex rookie of the year kept pace with Lang after the two were tied for second place at the end of the second round.

“It was a great day,” Seo said. “I was trying to be patient because I make mistakes. I tried to bounce back and it worked. It was a little bad luck on the 18th hole (a par); it’s OK.”

Seo said she is focused on one thing tomorrow.

“I don’t know how many are behind me, but always a win,” said Seo. “I have a few opportunities to win but I lost every time, so if I have a chance to win, I want to.”

Seo admitted that she was checking out the leaderboard Saturday to see what she had to do to catch up.

“Yeah, I’m always watching scores,” she said with a laugh.

Sweden’s Anna Nordqvist bounced back from a 1-over par 72 in the second round to score 4 under in the third round to take sole possession of fourth place at 10 under par.

Leading the five Canadians that made the cut was Quebec’s Maude-Aimee Leblanc. The tall, Sherbrooke native shot a third round of 3 under to move to 4-under par for the tournament and into a tie for 26th place.

— The Canadian Press