Late Surge From England A Little To Late As United States Hold On.
Monday, 28th November, 2011
Apparently the ham that tournament host Tenniel Chu graciously prepared as a Thanksgiving meal for the United States players, families and friends isn’t the only ham being enjoyed by the U.S. team this week. Gary Woodland and Matt Kuchar for the United States claim that they have been “ham and egging it” through the first three rounds at the OMEGA Mission World Cup as the two find themselves tied for second and two strokes behind Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy heading into the final round.
Each playing in the event for the first time in his career, Woodland and Kuchar made a point to compliment each other during their post-round press conference.
“We ham and egged it pretty well,” Woodland said. “Matt really got us going early. I was kind of all over the place, and he made a birdie on the first hole, got the edge off. It was nice when I was struggling that he picked me up and fortunately I made some putts on the back nine. He had a huge up-and-down on the last hole that really kept the momentum going, and hopefully gives us a lot more momentum going into tomorrow.”
It was nice for me to help Gary out,” Kuchar said. “I think he's been playing better than anybody in the field this week. Gary has been just dragging me along for a couple of rounds and today I made a few birdies and was able to help out, and felt like I was part of the team today.”
The hamming and egging worked well after a disappointing bogey on the second as the group birdied five consecutive holes with Kuchar on holes 4, 7 and 8 and Woodland with birdies on hole 5 and 6.
The two will be in the second-to-last group Sunday, playing alongside a pair of major championship winners in Charl Schwartzel and Louis Oosthuizen of South Africa. In fact, of the teams making up the final two pairings, the United States is the only squad without at least one major championship winner on their team. In the final group, Ireland boasts the past two U.S. Open Championship winners in Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell. Playing with Ireland is the German team of Alex Cejka and Martin Kaymer, who won the 2010 PGA Championship.
“It's going to be an exciting day tomorrow,” Kuchar said. Alternate shot is an exciting format, and all of the teams at the top are fantastic teams with great players. (In) alternate shot you generally try not to make mistakes, but I think tomorrow with as many good teams that are up there, we are going to have to try to be aggressive and make some birdies. I think as good of quality as the top teams are, it's going to take a good score tomorrow to win.“
Much has been made of the foursomes, alternate shot format. Teams are forced to plan their tee shots around the course, taking into account their strengths and weaknesses against the layout of the course. For Kuchar, he thinks that strategy means less than form as they approach Sunday’s final round.
“It works out very well that I tee off on the first hole and on all of the odd holes. It just works out very well that a lot of the par 5s, a lot of the holes that Gary can really take advantage of his length, happen to be the even holes. So it's a very easy strategy for us,” Kuchar said. “The strategy is a very, very small part of the equation there. It really comes down to who is playing the best golf and I feel awfully lucky to have Gary being the other guy on my team.”
Woodland, who entered the 2011 season outside the top 500 in the Official World Golf Ranking, was one of the surprises of 2011 on the PGA TOUR after a battling shoulder in his rookie season in 2009 and splitting time between the PGA TOUR and the Nationwide Tour in 2010. Woodland captured the Transitions Championship in March, finished 30th or better at all four major championships, and ended the season 17th in the FedExCup standings.
One year after finishing second in the FedExCup standings and winning the Vardon Trophy for low adjusted scoring average, Matt Kuchar posted nine top-10s on the PGA TOUR in 2011 and earned a spot on his first U.S. Presidents Cup Team, which was victorious U.S. last week in Australia at Royal Melbourne GC.
The United States has won the World Cup 23 times in 55 previous events held, but not since 2000 when Tiger Woods and David Duval won the event in Argentina.
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