Tiger Woods Sets Pace Early With Phil Mickelson Right on His Tail

Perhaps some of the competition was getting a little too close for comfort.

Perhaps he was still livid about being outplayed by Phil Mickelson during the final round of the Masters and coming up short at Augusta for the fourth consecutive year.

Perhaps some of his critics were getting, well, a little too critical of him.

Whatever the reason may be, this morning Tiger Woods did exactly what he has been doing in this type of situation for the past 13 years; he went out and sent a clear message to his competition and critics that he is still very capable of completely dominating a golf tournament.

Woods teed off the 10th hole at 7:50 a.m.  After firing a one-under par 35 over his first nine holes, he once again appeared to be in the midst of an indifferent round of golf.

However, Woods’ back-nine was anything but.  

Woods recorded six birdies on the back nine en route to an opening-round 65, which was good enough for a two-stroke lead after 18 holes.

The big difference for Woods today was his putter. 

He needed just 26 putts to get around this morning and made four out of five putts from between 10-15 feet, a range that has given Woods trouble since his return to the PGA Tour in late February.

Woods set the pace early, but his familiar rival, Phil Mickelson, put together a solid round of his own this afternoon.  Mickelson played the front nine in 4-under-par and finished with a score of 67 which places him just two strokes behind Woods.

Despite Woods’ seven-under-par round of 65, the highlight of the day was actually Mickelson’s par on the 18th.

Mickelson found the bunker with his drive on the 478-yard par-four 18th before duck-hooking his second shot about 50 yards left of the green where his ball came to rest just off of the cart path.

In true Mickelson form, he somehow got a 60-degree wedge under the ball while avoiding contact with the path. The ball then bounced on the green twice before stopping less then three feet from the hole where he would tap it in for par.

Over the past 13 years, there have been few stretches where both Woods and Mickelson have been playing at their very best at the exact same time.

This might just be one of those times.

There is certainly a lot of golf yet to be played, but if Woods and Mickelson keep up on the same pace, we could see another battle of these two titans this weekend at Quail Hollow.

Let’s keep our fingers crossed!