[ U.S. WOMEN'S PUBLINX]
Bo Wie comforted her daughter, Michelle, yesterday after Michelle lost to Ya-Ni Tseng in the final of the Women's Amateur Public Links Championship in Williamsburg, Va.
Wie falls in Publinx final
Ya-Ni Tseng makes a late charge
to defeat the defending champ
WILLIAMSBURG, Va. » Once the only teen sensation of female golfers, tall and regal and in training for greatness, Michelle Wie learned this week it might not be easy to stay at the top.
The 14-year-old from Punahou School failed in her bid to repeat as the U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links champion yesterday, losing 1-up when Ya-Ni Tseng made a 12-foot putt for birdie to cap a dramatic comeback on the 36th hole.
"I think that golf is getting better, and golf is getting younger," Wie said before heading to Massachusetts for this week's U.S. Women's Open, where she was scheduled to play a practice round at 9 a.m. today (3 a.m. Hawaii time).
"Nothing really worked out for me today from the start to the end," Wie said, her eyes welling up with tears. "I just played terribly.
"I made a lot of bogeys and gave a lot of strokes away."
Had Wie won, she would have been the fourth to repeat as titlist, and the fifth two-time winner overall. The last repeat winner was Pearl Sinn (1988-89) while Jo Jo Robertson won in 1995 and 1997.
Lori Castillo Planos -- a sales rep for golf-club manufacturer PING, Inc. -- is the only golfer from Hawaii to accomplish the feat. She won in 1979 and 1980.
Tseng, a 15-year-old from Taiwan who has spent the past three summers as the guest of Ernie Huang of San Diego, rallied from 4 down after 14 holes and 1 down with three to play. She also handed Wie the 15th hole by hitting her drive into the woods and having to hit again from the tee.
Wie then helped create her own demise, lipping out a 6-footer for a three-putt on the 16th green, allowing Tseng to get even. She also left her blast from a perfect lie in the sand 25 winding feet from the cup on the finishing hole, and then left her putt sitting on the right edge.
"I think I got a bit tired at the end," Wie said. "I couldn't keep my, what do you call it, concentration level up. I had a hard time putting. That was the main problem. I couldn't get anything close to the hole."
When Tseng rolled hers in to complete the stunning upset, she sought out Huang and hugged him on the side of the green, while Wie wept and hugged her mother, Bo.
Wie's coach, Gary Gilchrist, who walked every hole with her throughout the grueling six-day event, said the loss would be valuable for Wie, who is well into her grooming for a professional career.
"It's going to teach her to hang in, which she did to the end, and over time, she's going to have to understand that there's up and downs in the game of golf," he said. "She got beaten by a pretty good putt."
Tseng looked as though she would lose when she dropped to 4-down after 14 holes, but she never gave up hope. She cut the deficit to 2-up with her first birdie from the sand on the 18th hole, closed to 1 up with a 4-foot birdie on the 21st hole and rose at the finish for her biggest victory.
It was reminiscent of how Wie won last year when becoming the youngest winner of this event. She defeated 21-year-old Virada Nirapathpongporn, of Thailand, 1-up in the 36-hole final at the par-72, 6,068-yard Ocean Hammock Golf Club in Palm Coast, Fla.
Nirapathpongporn was 4-up following the eighth hole of the match, but Wie began cutting into the lead until the match was squared on the 14th hole. Nirapathpongporn went back ahead on the 20th hole, and was 2-up after 22 holes, but Wie evened the match again on the 24th.
Wie took the lead on the 25th hole and never trailed again. Nirapathpongporn got the match back to square with two holes to play, but Wie birdied the 35th hole to move back in front.
Both players parred the 36th and final hole, giving Wie the 1-up victory.
Yesterday, Wie only trailed early, but felt she was playing from behind all day.
"Even though I was 2-up, I felt like I was 5-down because I lost so many holes in a row," she said. "I tried to think (the second 18) was a new round, but I had a lot of pressure on me in the second round.
"I just didn't work, function. I didn't function at all."
Tseng feared she would be nervous before the round, but said her nerves subsided after her first drive. A birdie at No. 2 calmed her further.
Even when Wie finally got going and started winning holes, including three out of four to take the 4-up lead, "I tried to calm down and said there are a lot of holes to play," Tseng said through an interpreter.
"I kept telling myself I needed some birdies to get some holes back."
The key, she said, came on the 30th hole, when Wie hit her second shot 20 yards over the green, left her chip on the edge of the green, 15 feet away, and ran a putt she needed 3 feet by before Tseng made birdie.
It closed her to within one hole of all square, and she said when she made a tying birdie on the 32nd hole, "that's when I felt I had a chance."
Wie's three-putt on the 16th green -- her first putt went about 6 feet past, and her second lipped out -- brought the match back to even, and a pair of long two-putts on the par-3 17th brought it to the par-5 18th.
Tseng hit her drive long and right, the ball sitting up nicely in the rough. Wie hit the fairway a few yards further back and went first, her 3-wood going left of the green and rolling into a greenside sand trap.
Tseng, another long hitter, first grabbed an iron from her bag, then reconsidered and hit a wood, ignoring the sand trap protecting the flag in the right corner of the green and hitting the ball into the trap.
Wie's chip from the sand came up well short of where she wanted it to, despite her imploring it to "get up," and Tseng blasted to 12 feet.
After Wie's 25-footer stopped on the edge, Tseng holed the winner.
BACK TO TOP |
Wie unable to follow
in Planos’ footsteps
It was a different game and a different era some 20 years ago when Lori Castillo Planos was trying to defend her U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championship.
Women's golf didn't grab the national attention back then, certainly not the attention that has been focused on Michelle Wie since she became the youngest Publinx titlist last year at age 13.
Yesterday, Wie lost her bid to repeat as champion when falling to Ya-Ni Tseng of Taiwan 1-up in the 36-hole final at Williamsburg, Va. Wie would have become the fifth two-time winner, the fourth repeat champion and the second from Hawaii.
Planos did it in 1979 and 1980, at ages 19 and 20.
"It's a difficult thing to do, to repeat," said Planos, a sales rep for golf club manufacturer PING, Inc. on Maui. "There are such expectations. The person chasing you does not have much to lose.
"I think that in a lot of people's eyes, Michelle is a clear favorite."
Planos also won the Junior World and the USGA junior championships. She also became the first from Hawaii to play in the Curtis Cup (1980), which Wie also did earlier this month.
"But it was different for me," Planos said of defending the Publinx title. "I wasn't playing in LPGA tournaments. And I didn't have the exceptional ability that Michelle has.
"For me, I wanted to prove the first one wasn't a fluke. I had won the junior girls' title and you want to confirm to yourself that you can compete at the next level with adults. Going back (to defend) it was nice in a sense that everyone knew who you were more than you knew who you were."
But, Planos said, it is difficult to have to prove it again.
"The pressure is a good part of the process, too," she said. "It's good for Michelle when she's expected to win. It's different when people don't expect you to win."
Planos dismisses any comparisons between her and the incoming Punahou School sophomore.
"Michelle is a Picasso," Planos said in an interview earlier this year. "I'm just a local artist."
