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Love off to great start, but it's how you finish

By BOB HARIG

© St. Petersburg Times, published March 22, 2001

PONTE VEDRA BEACH -- Joe Durant has more victories, Tiger Woods far more scrutiny. But if you're Davis Love III, you have to like the way things are progressing at this important point in the season.

Or do you?

Love, a winner of 14 PGA Tour titles and long regarded as one of the game's stars, can look at his season to date in two different ways.

He has a victory and three close calls, perhaps signaling that he again will be among the dominant players, someone to fear.

But there is a more troubling outlook, one that continues a recent trend of high finishes, big paychecks and no trophies.

Love enters the prestigious Players Championship, which begins this morning at the TPC-Sawgrass Stadium Course, as one of the hottest players in the game.

He has five top-10 finishes this season, including a victory at Pebble Beach in early February, where he shot a final-round 63 that included a front-nine 28 to come from seven strokes off the pace. He is second to Durant on the PGA Tour money list. He is looking forward to the Masters in two weeks.

"I'm not playing perfect golf, but I'm playing determined, confident golf," said Love, who has earned $1.4-million this season. "The difference is that I'm scoring, that I'm making putts when I need to, and that I believe I'm going to make them. You've got to realize that it takes patience. You've got to shoot the right scores at the right time."

And yet, if Love had some more timely numbers, he might be entering today's $6-million event with multiple victories.

Instead, he has his victory at Pebble Beach -- and three more chances that arguably got away.

After Pebble Beach, Love played in the last group at the Buick Invitational, the Nissan Open and the Genuity Championship. He lost in a playoff to Phil Mickelson at the Buick, blew a three-shot 54-hole lead at the Nissan and missed a playoff by two, and ended up sixth behind winner Durant at the Genuity.

That's some pretty fine golf for one of the game's best players. And yet, how much better could it be? His game is not much different from when he suffered through nearly three years without a win.

"Every day there is a missed opportunity, a bad shot or bogey from the middle of the fairway," Love said. "I thought maybe I had gotten past that for a stretch. But I guess that's where I want to be. If everything does not go quite right, I lose in a playoff or screw up the last couple of holes and do not win.

"If everything is going right, I ought to be able to blow people away. There was a time where I had a few tournaments where I did walk away with them. You see what Tiger did last year. There was a lot of tournaments he did not win by a nip; he blew them away. I think that is really the difference between playing good and playing great."

Love enters the Players Championship at least in a different frame of mind from a year ago, when he arrived after a difficult loss to Woods at the Bay Hill Invitational.

During that tournament, Love all but admitted defeat before the final-round pairing with Woods, so great was the intimidation factor Woods had working for him. Love's runner-up finish was one of seven he had since his last victory, in 1998.

Before his Pebble Beach victory, he went 62 tournaments and 33 months on the PGA Tour without a win. And yet, he was a frequent contender.

Love gained a boost of confidence in December at the unofficial Williams World Challenge, where he blew past Woods and Sergio Garcia with a final-round 64 to win the $1-million first prize. Then he came from way back at Pebble, setting up the potential for a monster year.

The difference, Love said, is mostly putting. "I'm stepping up there knowing I'm going to make them," he said. "That's what happens when you're playing well. You have that confidence."

And with it comes results. Love leads the tour in scoring average at 68.8 strokes per round. And he is third in driving distance, averaging 294.3 yards off the tee.

It is not unlike 1992, the year Love won the Players Championship, two other tournaments and finished second on the money list to Fred Couples.

"This is the time of year you had better be ready to play," Love said. "I'm coming in here, the first big tournament of the year, trying to just play and let that confidence that I've had the last six weeks come out. There's always four or five guys who have that kind of confidence and are looking forward to playing. I think that's the difference."

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