ASSOCIATED PRESS A 73 yesterday was good enough for Michelle Wie to make the cut, but she sits 10 strokes back, out of contention.

Wie puts in a day of work

It was a grind-it-out, make-the-cut kind of round for Michelle Wie yesterday.

But it was an attack-the-course, score-low kind of day for a lot of other golfers at the Fields Open in Hawaii at windless Ko Olina Resort. The second round ended with the leaders in double-digit under-par numbers, while Wie battled to stay in the red and survive to play another day.

Wie shot 1-over 73. Coupled with her 3-under 69 in Thursday's first round, the 2 under was enough to make the cut. Conditions were near perfect, with nearly no wind, but four bogeys took away any chance of a monster round that would put her anywhere near contention.

Wie is tied for 41st with seven other golfers, including defending champion Stacy Prammanasudh (70-72) and Sacred Hearts senior Ayaka Kaneko (72-70), the only amateur in the field.

Kaneko and Wie start 20 minutes apart this morning, both at the 10th tee -- Kaneko at 8:50 with Charlotte Mayorkas and Meena Lee and Wie at 9:10 with Cindy Posechnik and Leta Lindley.

Afterward yesterday, Wie said she wasn't disappointed by shooting over par, and actually felt she played better than Thursday. She didn't get discouraged when she couldn't get a run of birdies going as she did in the first round.

"I tell myself I have a choice of either sulking about it or thinking about a situation, or I can make a little game out of it and pull myself out," Wie said.

Some of that obviously has to do with these being her best back-to-back competitive rounds since she closed out the Evian Masters in July 2006, with 70 and 68 and finished tied for second.

It's funny when an 18-year-old says "It felt like old times," which was Wie's reaction to a 35-foot downhill putt to save par on the 489-yard No. 5 yesterday. Actually, this might be something new, as Wie's putting Thursday and for the front nine yesterday was as good as -- if not better than -- ever.

"Yesterday my putter was really hot, so that's why I dropped a lot of putts. Today I also dropped a lot of long ones early on," Wie said. "I'm a little rusty (for) tournament mode, but I feel like I have two really solid rounds under my belt.

"Hopefully the score (today) will show how well I'm playing," she said.

Some of the numbers (six fairways and seven greens missed yesterday) don't agree with Wie's positive assessment of her game. But she's not trying to get back to where she was two years ago all in one round or one tournament.

"You know, it's still very early on," she said. "It's my first tournament back. ... I feel like my distance is coming back. I had a lot of really good solid shots. Had a couple bad breaks on a couple of lies throughout the round. That's what golf is."

She made the best of a terrible lie on No. 11, where she nearly saved par despite having to punch back onto the fairway from far to the left, with her ball nestled in rough dangerously near the curb -- not only dangerous to her score, but also to her injury-prone wrists.

After a couple of practice swings, Wie managed to get through some trees and to within 40 feet of the flag. She chipped to 6 feet, but her putt for par stopped one rotation short of the hole.

"I think it was seriously one of the best shots that I hit today. I had a 7-iron and I was on the path, so the ball was a lot higher than my feet," she said. "I just felt like I was really confident with that shot. I just really trusted myself.

"Just a really interesting shot. I never had it before, and I hope I never do again."