NO. 1 KO CREEPING UP ON LEADERS AT U.S. WOMEN’S OPEN
Jin Young Ko, the world’s No. 1 player, vaulted into contention for a third major championship Friday, playing the final five holes in 3 under to pull within three shots of second-round leaders Minjee Lee and Mina Harigae at the U.S. Women’s Open.
Harigae and Lee were at 9-under 133 after 36 holes at Pine Needles in Southern Pines, N.C. Lee shot a 5-under 66, and Harigae had a 69.
Three-time major champion Anna Nordqvist and Hye-Jin Choi, who shot a 64 to come within shot of matching the lowest round in the event’s 77-year history, were 7 under. Nordqvist had a 68.
Ko was tied for fifth at 6 under with Swedish amateur Ingrid Lindblad. Ko shot 67, and Lindblad followed up her event amateur-record 65 on Thursday with a 71.
Among notables who won’t be playing on the weekend include 10-time major champion Annika Sorenstam and 2014 champion Michelle Wie West, who missed the cut in her second-tolast event before retiring.
Spring Valley teen Anna Davis had a much improved second round at 1 over, missing the cut at 11 over.
More golf
Danielle Kang revealed that she played the first two rounds of the U.S. Open with a tumor on her spine. The 29-year-old American, ranked No. 12 in the world, said she learned of the diagnosis “a few weeks ago” and has undergone multiple tests, but it’s not clear yet whether the tumor is malignant or benign.
• At the PGA Tour’s Memorial, Cameron Smith elicited one of the loudest cheers of a glorious afternoon at Muirfield Village in Dublin, Ohio — an anomaly for this weather-plagued tournament — when he holed out with a downhill chip from beyond the green on the par-3 12th that carried him to a 3-under 69, maintaining his one-shot lead over Denny McCarthy and K.H. Lee.
• Kirk Triplett shot 9-under 63 to take a twostroke lead over Jerry Kelly, Ken Tanigawa and Brett Quigley after one round of the PGA Tour
Champions’ Principal Charity Classic.
College baseball
Top-eight national seeds Tennessee, Stanford, Texas A&M and East Carolina had easy wins on their home fields in NCAA baseball regional openers. Tommy Troy hit his third and fourth homers of the season and finished with a career-best four hits and five RBIs in No. 2 Stanford’s 20-7 victory over Binghamton.
College softball
Megan Faraimo (Cathedral Catholic HS) pitched a complete game and hit a solo homer, helping No. 5 UCLA beat No. 9 Northwestern 6-1 in a Women’s College World Series elimination game. Faraimo (23-5) gave up five hits and struck out 10. Maya Brady had three hits for the Bruins (49-9), who will play in another elimination game Sunday against the loser of today’s Texas-Oklahoma matchup.
Arizona outlasted Pac-12 rival Oregon State in the late elimination game with a 3-1 victory, as Carly Sculpin went 3-for-3, including an RBI double for the tiebreaking run in the sixth. Sophia Carroll also had an RBI double for Arizona (38-20), which will face the loser of today’s Florida-Oklahoma State game on Sunday.
Soccer
After initially blaming fans, UEFA apologized to them for the “frightening and distressing ” chaos at the Champions League final after Real Madrid joined Liverpool in demanding the organizer explains what went wrong at the Stade de France.
“UEFA wishes to sincerely apologise to all spectators who had to experience or witness frightening and distressing events in the buildup to the UEFA Champions League final” last Saturday, it said in a statement. “No football fan should be put in that situation, and it must not happen again.”
• Denmark stunned titleholder France 2-1 in their opening Nations League match at the Stade de France, ending the world champion’s seven-match winning streak. Also, the Netherlands produced its first win against bitter rival Belgium in 25 years by 4-1 in Brussels, in another group of the the top-tier League A.
Also
The Big 12 Conference is distributing a record $426 million of revenue to its 10 schools for the 2021-22 school year, a nearly 25 percent increase over last year and 10 percent higher than its prepandemic peak.