[ GOLF ]
Michelle Wie watched her shot from the rough on the eighth hole during match play against Melissa Martin yesterday.
Wie’s game comes alive
as she advancesThe defending Publinx champion
reaches today's quarterfinals
WILLIAMSBURG, Va. » Three rounds into the defense of her U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championship, Michelle Wie is getting closer and closer to getting her game into championship form for the weekend.
"I'm getting there," the 14-year-old said yesterday after beating good friend and Curtis Cup teammate Jane Park 2 and 1 in the third round.
"My game is getting better every day. In match play, you can't give strokes away and I've been doing that very well the last three rounds."
Earlier yesterday, Wie beat Melissa Martin 3 and 1 in the second round, finishing just before the first of two rain delays stopped play for nearly three hours and prevented one third-round match from being completed.
Stephanie Kono, who like Wie is a 14-year-old Punahou student, and Lihue's Lehua Wise lost early yesterday and did not advance to the third round.
Kono lost to Hannah Jun of San Diego 2 and 1, while Wise, a Kauai High School graduate, was eliminated by In-Bee Park of Eustis, Fla., 4 and 3.
Wie was hurt by a rain delay in the second round of stroke play. This time she used the stoppage to her advantage -- taking the opportunity to grab lunch with her parents, then catching a quick nap.
"I think the three-hour rain delay really helped me," she said.
So did her putter, which started to come alive after two days of near misses that consistently prevented her from posting much lower numbers.
In the morning, she won five holes with one putt, then used a two-putt on the par-3 17th to finally put away Martin, of Altadena, Calif.
Against Park, she made a 9-footer to take a 1-up lead on No. 7, a 15-footer to take another 1-up lead on 12, a 12-footer to take the lead for good on 14 and a 6-footer on 17 to close it out.
Beating her good friend was hard, but necessary, Wie said.
"Coming in today, I didn't want to play Jane because we're just so close," Wie said of her Curtis Cup roommate. "It's always easier to beat somebody or to mentally be tough when you don't really know the person.
"It's one of those things where you say, 'I really like you, but I have to beat you,' " she said before she and Park broke into laughter.
Wie advanced to a fourth-round match against Jenna Pearson, the No. 2 qualifier. Pearson, of Wheaton, Ill., beat Shannon Johnson of Sioux Falls, S.D., 1-up in the morning and Elena Kurokawa 2 and 1 in the afternoon.
Kurokawa, of Redondo Beach, Calif., earlier beat Noriko Nakazaki of Hanover Park, Ill., with a par on the 22nd hole after the rain delay.
Medalist Brittany Lang of McKinney, Texas, also continued to coast through the first four days. She beat Jenny Suh of Fairfax 3 and 2 in the morning, then beat Janet Dyer of Starkville, Miss., by the same score.
"When I play in tournaments back to back, I wouldn't say I get hot, but my game rises because I'm playing so much," she said.
Lang also played for the U.S. team in the Curtis Cup earlier this month.
Other double winners yesterday were In-Bee Park of Eustis, Fla., Hannah Jun of San Diego, Nara Shin of Chula Vista, Calif., and Angela Park of Torrance, Calif. The last third-round match between Ya-Ni Tseng of Taiwan and Ashley Grier of Hagerstown, Md., was suspended after 20 holes and will be concluded today before the fourth round. The fifth round will follow.
The tournament concludes with a 36-hole championship tomorrow.
Wie went ahead to stay on 14, but thought a 15-footer for birdie on the par-5 15th that preceded one by Park was the biggest shot.
"That was huge because I knew I had to make birdie because Jane was definitely going to birdie there," Wie said of her bending, uphill putt.
Despite her putting woes and too many makable tries that skate by the hole, Wie showed she was closer to figuring out the greens on the Green Course at Golden Horseshoe Golf Club when the putts mattered most.
Against Martin, she tied it with a 2-footer on No. 8 after a dazzling shot from the rough about 50 yards out, went ahead with a 9-foot putt on the par-4 13th after outdriving Martin by 70 yards, then doubled her advantage at the par-5 15th after hitting her chip to about 30 inches.
Martin, who said she arrived at the course hoping to be paired against Wie in a clear case of "David and Goliath," was impressed in defeat.
"I was proud of myself," Martin said. "I knew she wouldn't give me too many, and she didn't, and that's the way a match should be."
