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Tiger Woods snares 1-shot victory at Doral
(AP)
Updated: 2006-03-06 09:24
Woods finished at 20-under 268 and earned $990,000.
It was his 48th career victory, and it enhanced his reputation as the best
closer in golf. Woods now is 34-3 when he has at least a share of the 54-hole
lead on the PGA Tour, and he has never lost in 20 tries when leading by at least
two going into the last round.
Toms and Villegas each shot 67 to finish at 269, and they left in a different
frame of mind.
Villegas was a darling before this largely Latino gallery in south Florida,
and while he challenged Woods briefly on the front nine, his two birdies over
the final five holes pushed him up the leaderboard. He was three shots behind
playing the 18th, and realized there was little hope of catching Woods.
"We are talking here about the best player in the world," Villegas said. "I
played well. I had fun."
Toms made back-to-back birdies to start the back nine and pulled within one
shot, then added another birdie on the 16th to get within two shots of the lead.
He never looked at a leaderboard, and only figured he was in range by the energy
from the gallery on another tropical day at the Blue Monster.
But that changed on the 18th, which always has been a tough hole for him. He
had a decent lie in the rough, but couldn't go after the flag with a 4-iron, so
he played smartly to the fat part of the green. An NBC analyst told him that
Woods had bogeyed the 17th, and the lead was down to one shot.
"I wasn't even nervous all day because I'm trying to catch the guy," Toms
said. "All of a sudden, I've got a putt all the way across the green, big break,
and I'm nervous because I'm just trying to two-putt. That's my mistake. But if I
had been looking at it all day, then maybe I would have felt that way all the
way through the back nine."
Toms didn't beat himself up over a bogey on the 18th, one of the toughest
closing holes on the PGA Tour that played to an average of 4.5 shots in the
final round.
He was more frustrated with a 70 in the third round, which left him three
shots behind Woods.
"When you play against Tiger, you can't slip up," Toms said. "You just have
to play solid every day."
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