It’s not about where Tiger finished, just that he did
He plays through five rounds in first tourney since 2015.
Sophomore Kenny Williams III had 14 of his careerhigh 19 points in the opening five minutes and host No. 3 North Carolina routed Radford 95-50 Sunday in Chapel Hill.
The Tar Heels (8-1), coming off a loss at No. 13 Indiana in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, lost point guard Joel Berry II to a sprained left ankle early in the second half.
Justin Cousin scored 14 points to lead the Highlanders (3-5).
(At) No. 13 Indiana 83, Southeast Missouri State 55: Robert Johnson had 17 points and seven rebounds and De’Ron Davis added 14 points to help the Hoosiers (7-1) beat the Redhawks (4-4).
No. 20 South Carolina 70, Florida International 54: Duane Notice tied his career high with 27 points and P.J. Dozier added 20 as the Gamecocks (8-0) defeated the Panthers (3-6). South Carolina announced before the game that leading scorer and rebounder Sindarius Thornwell was suspended indefinitely for violating an athletic department policy. NASSAU, BAHAMAS — The return of Tiger Woods was more about the big picture than any of his big numbers.
And that started with the Harold Varner III (19-under sight of that red shirt on Sun269) won the Australian PGAday. Championship in Gold Coast Woods grumbled about by two shots over Andrew three more double bogeys in Dodt and four over Adam the final round of the Hero Scott. World Challenge. Consider
He was the first Ameriing how badly he has felt in can to win the Australian the 15 months since he last PGA title since Hale Irwin played, he still was able to in 1978 at Royal Melbourne, keep it in perspective. and the first non-Australian “It feels good to be back to claim the title since 1999. out here playing again, com
Alfred Dunhill Champipeting and trying to beat the onship: Brandon Stone (22best players in the world,” under 266) ran away from Woods said. “I missed it. I his challengers in Malelane, love it.” South Africa, to win by seven He even loved some of his shots over Richard Sterne for golf at Albany. his second European Tour Woods made 24 birdies, title. Charl Schwartzel (12t h e most o f a nyo n e t h i s under 276) tied for fourth. week. He also had six double bogeys, three of them in the final round. The last one on the final hole, his third of the week on the 18th, gave him a 4-over 76. It was the highest score of the tournament, and he finished 15th in the 17-man field.
The other players were not about to measure him by his score — not yet, anyway.
“The whole world is watching a couple of rounds of go l f , ” s a i d B r i t i s h Open c h a mpi o n He n r i k S t e n - son, who finished second to Hideki Matsuyama. “It’s great to see him back and healthy and playing. I want to see him up in contention and try to beat him when it matters the most.
“Give him three or four tournaments, maybe six tournaments, maybe around the Masters,” he said. “It’s easy to overanalyze a very limited amount of golf.”
Rarely has a December event attracted this much curiosity. Woods, the dominant player of his generation, had gone 466 days since his previous tournament because o f t w o b a c k s u r g e r i e s . The recovery at times made it difficult for him to walk and led him to wonder if he would ever play.
“Getting back to this point is beyond anything that I’ve ever experienced in my lifetime,” said Woods, who turns 41 at the end of the month. “The pain issues that I had, it was rough. Quite frankly, there some pretty dire times where I just couldn’t move.”
Woods showed no stress in his swing or in walking five straight rounds, starting with the pro-am.
“It’s kind of new to me again, the feel of playing, the feel of adrenaline in my system, hitting shots,” Woods said.
“What he did here showed that he’s certainly up for the task and his game is there. He’s ready to go,” Jordan Spieth said. “Even with Tiger, every time we set expectations, he exceeds them.”
Woods st ar ts hi s climb from No. 898 in the world, the product of not playing since Aug. 23, 2015.
He said he wants to play a full schedule in 2017 — that t ypically means no more than about 20 a year — and will look at his options over the next few weeks.