Golf

The 19th hole

By BOB HARIG
Published June 23, 2005

DIVOTS

PINEHURST, PART III: The U.S. Golf Association has made it clear Pinehurst No. 2 is one of the strongest venues in its unofficial rotation for the U.S. Open. Pebble Beach and Shinnecock Hills also are on the list. But the Open won't be returning as quickly as it did this year, just six years after a successful 1999 run. Future U.S. Opens are committed through 2012, with 2013 thought to be going to The Country Club to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Francis Ouimet's victory there. Shinnecock has not been given a future Open, which means it could be another 10 years before Pinehurst gets another shot. By then, Tiger Woods will be 39.

LPGA IN FLORIDA? Hard to believe, but it has been more than four years since the LPGA Tour staged a full-field event in Florida. The last was the Office Depot tournament at Miami's Doral Resort in January 2001. (The ADT Championship for the top 30 money winners has been played in West Palm Beach since 2001.) But there are murmurs the tour will return in April for an event at the Reunion Resort, south of Orlando. Although outgoing commissioner Ty Votaw has said he wanted to return to Florida only if he had more than one strong event, the idea makes sense in that the tour has tournaments at the same time in Tennessee and Atlanta, making for a southern swing. And it doesn't hurt that Annika Sorenstam has a relationship with the resort.

QUOTEABLE: "I snuck in there without anybody noticing. All the media hype was on (Retief) Goosen winning back-to-back, Jason (Gore) playing so well for three rounds and being the Cinderella story, and Tiger (Woods) threatening. And there was little old me." - Michael Campbell after his U.S. Open victory on Sunday.

STAT OF THE WEEK: Michelle Wie will make her 18th LPGA Tour appearance when she plays in the U.S. Women's Open. Wie, 15, an amateur, would have earned $632,420 in the previous LPGA events had she been a pro.

[Last modified June 23, 2005, 00:46:08]