[ GOLF ]
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Punahou student Michelle Wie hit out of the 13th bunker yesterday during the second round of the ShopRite LPGA Classic in Galloway Township, N.J. Wie barely made the cut at 1 over.
Wie makes cut by 1
at ShopRite ClassicPutting is the bane for Wie,
who is 11 behind the leader
GALLOWAY TOWNSHIP, N.J. >> "She could be the one."
Annika Sorenstam sounded as if she were ready to garb Michelle Wie in a pair of wraparound sunglasses and a black leather duster and hand the teenager from Hawaii the "Neo" role in the next "Matrix" movie.
"I cannot relate at all. She's playing at a totally different level than I did at that age."
Sorenstam's statement evoked memories of what Bobby Jones once said about the young Jack Nicklaus: "He plays a game with which I am not familiar."
Jones, ever the scholar, was careful not to end his pronouncement with a preposition.
Sorenstam, ever the pragmatist, was careful to end hers with a caveat.
"... at that age."
With Wie, golf's latest wonder kid, age is everything. It's the exclamation point at the end of each line in her golfing resume:
>> Three hundred-yard drives.Yesterday, the Punahou School student made the cut at the ShopRite Classic, finishing with a 1-over-par 72 for a 36-hole 143. Wie was 11 strokes behind leader Angela Stanford, a 25-year-old who has yet to win since joining the LPGA Tour in 2000.>> U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links champion.
>> Played in the final group at an LPGA major.
>> At age 13.
Stanford is clinging to a one-stroke lead over Juli Inkster and three others, while the tour's top player -- Sorenstam -- is lurking four shots back. Stanford, who came into the day sharing the lead with two others, used solid iron play and putting to card five birdies en route to a two-day total of 132.
Sorenstam, who has won three tour events this year, shot a 70 in the opening round, saying later a new, livelier ball had given her trouble. But she birdied two of her first three holes yesterday and was poised to make a run at the championship today.
The low round of the day came from Patricia Meunier-Lebouc, who fired an 8-under 63, tying a tournament record.
Wie, meanwhile, continued to struggle with her putting, lipping the cup or narrowly missing several birdie opportunities.
On the 114-yard 13th, her tee shot landed in a sand trap and she recovered nicely, hitting a sand wedge from 25 feet that nearly went in. But then she missed a 3-foot putt and took a bogey.
"I feel frustrated and bummed out that I didn't play better," said Wie, who shot par in the opening round.
She had clashed over club choices with caddie B.J. Wie -- her father -- in Friday's opening round. Yesterday, she was asked if they got along better. "Yeah, I guess. Sometimes," she replied.
"I had never seen a woman swing and hit the golf ball like she does," said Leta Lindley, who played in Wie's group yesterday. "Her round could have been so much better. She missed quite a few short putts on the back side. She probably could have shot nine or 10 under."
Although Wie's putter was inconsistent, her biggest weapon, her 7.5-degree driver, wasn't.
"I had never seen anybody hit it that far," Lindley said. "She had wedges into par-4s that I was hitting woods into."
Lindley wasn't the only player outdriven by Wie. So was everyone else in the field; Wie led the tournament in driving distance at 286.3 yards.
Wie definitely digs the long ball. Last week in the Women's Public Links, she eagled one hole by hitting a 314-yard drive and a 172-yard 6-iron. But the driver, and even her fairway wood, sometimes leaves Wie with awkward half-wedges into greens on short par-4s. Why not hit the occasional 2-iron off the tee?
"If I ask her to use irons," said B.J. Wie, "her game changes."
"I think that'll come in time as she matures," Lindley said. "When you're swinging well, what do you have to lose when you're 13? It's not like she's playing for any money."
Winning the Women's Public Links was "a great relief" to the Wie family, B.J. Wie said. Stung by critics who said Michelle's invitations to LPGA events were merely publicity stunts, the Wies saw Michelle's first national championship as justification that she belongs in elite company.
There will be plenty of it later this year. After playing in the LPGA Shop-Rite Classic, Wie has four more events against women (Women's Open, Jamie Farr Kroger Classic, Safeway Classic and the C.J. Nine Bridges Classic) and two against men (Nationwide Tour Albertsons Boise Open and Canadian Tour Bay Mills Open Players' Championship) on her calendar.
All except next week's U.S. Women's Open are sponsor's exemptions. The Wies say they aren't concerned about negative reaction like the kind Sorenstam received from Vijay Singh and others over playing in a PGA Tour event.
"I don't really care, frankly," Michelle Wie said. "People say stuff and it goes into the paper, but I don't really pay attention to that. Sometimes it gets me mad and I want to play better to prove them wrong."
Wie says she takes different approaches when playing against different genders.
Against men, "I'm just thinking, just make the cut," she said. Against women, "I think that I have a chance to win."
That includes the Open, she insists.
"I have a lot of confidence going into the U.S. Open," she said, explaining that if she can stay close to even par, "then I'll be pretty well up on the leaderboard."
Does she really think she can win the Open?
"Hopefully, yeah."
Cox News Service and the Associated Press contributed to this report
