Stenson avoids wrecks, wins first Players Championship title

Mike Dudurich

Posted 2009-05-11

The television ratings for the final round of the Players Championship had to be astronomical. No, the golf wasn’t spectacular as the players thrashed their way around the Stadium Course at the TPC at Sawgrass. Actually, much of the afternoon, the golf was borderline ugly.

And that’s why those tuning in would love what they saw.

Train wrecks.

People love watching them. They get some sort of thrill from them. And they love watching the best players in the world implode and explode on a difficult golf course that can also be one of the most unpredictable on the PGA Tour.

And while the final pairing of Tiger Woods and Alex Cejka could do no better than a combined six-over par, quietly, surgically and spectacularly Sweden’s Henrik Stenson tore up the Stadium to record his biggest victory in professional golf by shooting a bogey-free final round.

“I think if you look at my resume, it's been a case on quite a few occasions that I've won tournaments with very strong fields, and that's obviously very pleasing, as well,” Stenson, who won the World Golf Championships Match Play event in 2007. “I won the Match Play, I won in Dubai when Tiger was in, played with Ernie three or four days and beat him down the stretch. No, it just seems to bring the best out of me when I have to play the best players, and obviously now I feel like I'm up there where I belong when I'm playing good.”

The numbers the big Swede posted Sunday certainly bear out that statement.

He hit 26 of 28 fairways on the weekend. Since 1992, the only Players champion to do as well was Davis Love III who posted that number in 1992.

He didn’t have a bogey in his last 19 holes, only the third time that’s happened in the Players since 1983 and the first time since Fred Couples did so in 1996. Stenson is the first champion of a PGA Tour event this year to go bogey-free in the final 19 holes.

“I just like the whole concept of risk and reward,” Stenson, who trailed by five shot coming into the final round, said. “You see pretty clearly what you can do, and if you pull off the shots, you're going to get rewarded, and if you don't, you're going to be in trouble a lot of times. I think it's a very fair and square golf course in that sense.

“It just suits my game off the tee. I mean, I like to hit my 3-wood a lot, and that club just matches perfectly around here, a little right-to-left shape a lot of times, and I had the ball in great position today, and it's easy to play from there. As I said, I found the feel on the greens early in the week and I was rolling it beautiful all week.”

He joined the leaders when he chipped in for a birdie on No. 7 and pulled away with a 32 on the back nine. He finished at 12-under par 276, four shots ahead of Ian Poulter of England.

The victory was Stenson’s 10th worldwide and moved him to fifth in the world rankings. It was the second-largest victory in the history of the Players, matching Justin Leonard’s feat in 1998.

All the attention, as Sunday reached mid-afternoon, was focused on the final group. Attrition the previous day had elevated Woods into that last group and it was assumed it would only be a matter of time until Tiger’s presence would steamroll Cejka and the world’s No. 1-ranked player would stroll to the title. Woods hit a perfect tee shot off the first tee, Cejka yanked his tee ball left into the trees. With the door open, Woods hit a wedge to the far right side of the green with the pin tucked to the left. Cejka made bogey, Woods par and it looked like the rout was on.

And it may have been, except that while Cejka kept hitting everything left, Woods continued to hit everything right. In the process, they were run over by Stenson, the Swedish bombshell

“I just kept hitting those spinners up to the right, and it was frustrating because if I aim down the right side, I'd spin it to the right; aim down the left side, spin it to the right. I tried to put the release in early enough, but it still wasn't right, Woods said. “For Henrik to do what he did was pretty incredible. He played great. We all know he's got all the talent in the world to do this. It was just a matter of time before he put it together. To do it on this stage was pretty impressive.”

Cejka came into the final round feeling good about his chances and even though he ended up shooting 77, he wasn’t crushed.

“You know, I kind of hit good shots, but I got bad breaks, bad lies, didn't make one putt,” he said. “You know, a couple drives were a little bit off and I'm in the bunker or first cut or whatever, and then just never had it going, not one momentum where you make a birdie or something or a good shot, a lucky break. I hit good shots into par-5s and I get screwed, terrible lies, like 11, like 2. I hit beautiful shots there, I should walk off with two birdies, and I struggled to make par.”

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