Open there for the taking
Women’s game lacking dominant player this season.
The U.S. Women’s Open has not had a repeat winner since Karrie Webb in 2001 and the chances of Brittany Lang doing it this year don’t seem good.
The 31-year-old Lang has finished no better than 13th in 14 events on the LPGA Tour, and she missed the cut in the KPMG Women’s PGA two weeks ago.
So who is going to win the biggest event in women’s golf at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J.?
World No. 1 ranked So Yeon Ryu of South Korea is the only player on the tour to win more than once in the 18 events played.
No. 2 ranked Ariya Jutanugarn of Thailand has nine top-10 finishes in 16 events, including a win, three seconds and a third.
Lexi Thompson, the topranked player from the United States, has a win and four seconds, while No. 4 Lydia Ko of New Zealand has something to prove after blowing the lead in the final round a year ago.
One could keep going down the list and find players capable of winning, including 39-year-old Cristie Kerr and No. 5 ranked In Gee Chun of South Korea, who won this event in 2015 in her first USGA event.
“I mean our tour has so much talent now,” said Kerr, who won the Open in 2007. “It’s really hard to answer that question. You feel like anybody could win on a given week.”
Even Lang believes she has a shot. She had not won last year when she took this event CordeValle Golf Club in California.
“It has been a little bit of a disappointing year,” Lang said Wednesday. “I’ve been hitting the ball so, so well for the last few months and really haven’t had any great finishes. So it’s been a little frustrating. I’m going to try to stay patient.”
Lang has finished no worse than 22nd in the past five Opens and she has top-15 finishes in three of the past four events.
“If you are hitting the ball really well, and I’m hitting it long right now, you should have a good chance at the U.S. Open,” she said. “I will be nervous and excited on the first tee tomorrow. I’m going in with a lot of confidence because I’ve been in control of my ball striking.”
PGA Tour: The often-overlooked John Deere Classic elevated its profile by helping Jordan Spieth become a star.
Spieth won’t be back in Silvis, Ill., this week, though, and neither will most of golf ’s top players. Some are playing in the Scottish Open to get a feel for a links-styled course ahead of next week’s British Open at Royal Birkdale.
Daniel Berger is the only player from the top 20 in the world — he’s No. 20 — at the TPC Deere Run, where Spieth made history in 2013 as the first teenager to win on the PGA Tour in 82 years.
The field gets its star power from a pair of locals — Zach Johnson, who grew up in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; and Steve Stricker, a three-time winner who played college golf at Illinois.
Senior LPGA: Trish Johnson completed a wire-to-wire victory in the Senior LPGA Championship, closing with a 1-over 73 to beat Michelle Redman by three strokes in the first-year event at French Lick, Indiana.