Zach attack pays off at Conway Farms

    Writing from Lake Forest, Illinois
    Monday, September 16, 2013

    Zach Johnson said earlier in the week that Conway Farms Golf Club’s yielding of low scores reminded him of TPC Deere Run, site of the John Deere Classic.
    “I’m not complaining,” Johnson said.
    Especially now. He completed a career Illinois Slam by grabbing the BMW Championship title on Monday, his bogey-free 6-under-par 65 for an aggregate of 16-under-par 268 beating fast-closing Nick Watney to the finish line by two strokes. Watney’s 7-under 64 was the round of the day, and got him to 270 – and to the Tour Championship at East Lake – but Johnson, who trailed overnight leader Jim Furyk by three when he teed off, passed both Furyk and Watney in the course of a frantic delayed-a-day finish to the 110th Western Open.
    Johnson took the lead for the first time when Furyk lipped out a par putt on the 13th hole and dropped to 13-under. Johnson was at 14-under after sinking a 8-footer for birdie on the par-4 12th.
    Watney was a few holes ahead, and birdied the par-3 17th to tie Johnson, but Johnson converted for birdie from 19 feet on the par-4 16th to regain the advantage. He doubled the margin to two strokes with a birdie on the par-3 17th, and coasted home, his 10th career victory placing him fourth in the PGA Tour’s playoff standings and thus within reach of the $10 million bonus if he wins on Sunday at East Lake. (He collected $1.44 million from Monday’s $8 million purse.)
    Johnson accomplished it, he said, by not thinking of the goal, just the process.
    “I was trying to make the Presidents Cup team (in Boston) without trying to make it,” Johnson said. “I was trying to make the top three (in the standings) without trying to make it. Now, I’m not going to try to win that $10 million. I’m going to try to play four solid rounds of golf.”
    As he did at Conway Farms. Rounds of 64-70-69-65 varied between solid and spectacular. He was bogey-free his last 31 holes, but never held even a share of the lead until the birdie at the 12th.
    Johnson has played stupid good golf since the Deere, where he lost to Jordan Spieth in a three-man playoff. After that second place, tied for sixth at the British Open, tied for fourth at Firestone, tied for eighth in the PGA Championship, tied for fifth in the Wyndham, and tied for 27th, his worst finish in two months, at the Deutsche Bank Championship, the second playoff tournament.
    Where was he during the Barclays? Not at Liberty National. There was a more pressing engagement.
    “I mean, you’re not going to miss your brother’s wedding, especially when you’re the best man,” Johnson said. “Especially if I’m going to get along with my new sister-in-law.”
    That included a scouting round at Conway the day before, when he charted places to hit it and not hit it for his yardage book. And that seemed to pay off. He only missed 11 of 54 fairways, and his 27 of 36 greens in the final two rounds.
    Johnson said a bad four-hole stretch dropped his standing at the Deutsche Bank, but making a putt on his last hole advanced him to Conway Farms, and from here, it’s off to East Lake with a shot at was old-timers would call bagging the whole bundle of boodle.
    Furyk failed to win for the fifth straight time while holding the 54-hole lead. Winless since 201, he was at even-par 71 on a day a number in the 60s was mandatory. Finishing third at 13-under 271, he was 12-under on his Friday 59 and 1-under the other three rounds.
    “I never looked at (the final round) as I have to hold on to the lead,” Furyk said. “That’s a definite bogey waiting to happen. Today the idea was to go out aggressive, hit the ball at the pins, try to shoot 4- or 5-under, make the rest of the field chase me.
    “I’m playing really well, on a golf course I like next week in Atlanta, and a win there could do some damage.”
    Furyk won the FedEx Cup in 2010. He’s 11th in the standings. The top five (Tiger Woods, Henrik Stenson, Adam Scott, Johnson and Matt Kuchar) cop the Cup if they win the Tour Championship. Everyone else has to win or finish high and depend on the kindness of strangers.
    Watney’s sparkling 64 started with birdies on the first three holes, and closed with birds on four of the last seven holes, but he needed to be below that when Johnson stepped up. A birdie that slid by the cup at the last and flew away stung.
    “I figured I had maybe an outside shot, but there’s so many good players ahead of me that I knew I’d need something special,” Watney said. “All you can ask for is a chance there, and I hit a good putt. It was really, really fun. I haven’t been in this position for a while, and to get back in the heat is awesome.”
    Watney improved 22 places in the playoff standings, rising to 12th from 34th, one of two players to jump into this week’s Tour Championship. The other? Read on.

    Donald to East Lake

    Conway Farms member Luke Donald didn’t win the tournament, but he won a ticket to East Lake after a 5-under-par 66 on Monday. That placed him at 11-under 273, tied for fourth, and when the rest of the marbles filtered down the Plinko machine, he was 29th of 30 qualifiers. And relieved.
    “I had to fight hard on that back nine,” Donald said after coming in in 4-under 32, a bogey offsetting one of his five birdies. “I figured at the beginning of the week top five or better was probably going to do it for me. I knew I had to go pretty low today. Fortunately I got it going a little bit on the back nine.”
    Donald has a history of low final rounds when he’s out of contention, but usually in less familiar surroundings. This was on his home course. But he was in a field of guys who are quick studies.
    “I had a bunch of lipouts this week,” Donald said. “If they had gone in I’d probably be contending for the title. I was hoping that being a member here would help me, and I think it did a little bit.”
    He got a member’s bounce on the par-4 15th, missing the fairway right, but carving a shot toward the green that hit the hillock to the right and bounced onto the green, rolling to within seven feet. He converted that for birdie to go to 11-under, and 5-under for the day. But a bogey at the 16th dropped him from hinting at contention. But he birdied 17 after a splendid iron to six feet, and gave the cup on 18 a scare as well.
    “There were nerves from 15 onwards,” Donald said. “I knew I got myself into position where I had a chance. That’s why we practice hard, to get in those positions.”
    And now, after Monday night’s stop at Wildcat Golf Day in Evanston, to East Lake, where, Donald said, “I’ve notoriously played pretty well.”
    He tied for third there last year, with a pair of 67s on the weekend.    
    Donald, 54th at the start of the Western, was one of only two players to climb into the top 30 in the FedEx Cup standings. The other was Watney (34th to 12th). They displaced Lee Westwood (30th to 41st) and Harris English (20th to 31st). Tiger Woods replaced Henrik Stenson at the top of the ladder. D.A. Points, the pride of Pekin, skidded from 21st to 28th with a 57th place finish at Conway, but advances. His heart sank when a birdie putt at the last hung on the left edge of the cup, defying gravity, but it proved a harmless miss in the end.

    Around Conway Farms

    Biggest job the next few weeks goes to Conway Farms superintendent Chad Ball and his tireless crew, who got the course ready for Monday after Sunday’s downpours, and now have to get the area covered by structures back into shape as the city for a week is taken apart. ... The field averaged 70.557 strokes in the fourth round, and 70.811 strokes for the week, the field thus beating the course, albeit barely. ... Presuming there’s no uproar from the membership, Conway Farms will host the tournament again in 2015. Next year’s edition, the 111th going back to 1899, is at Cherry Hills Country Club in Cherry Hills Village, Colo., outside of Denver, and famed for Arnold Palmer’s comeback victory in the 1960 U.S. Open. ... The WGA said over 130,000 fans came out for the week. There appeared to be about 7,500 on hand on Monday, a decent crowd considering the last-minute rearrangement of the schedule because of Sunday’s downpour, and a late shift in the parking to Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, another 10 miles to the north.

    – Tim Cronin