O'Hair Snares Tiger This Time at Quail Hollow

Sean O’Hair is the classic example of leadership development on the PGA TOUR.

One’s mettle is tested in fire and therefore strengthens through adversity.

Getting there on Sunday afternoon, if only to fall short and be beaten, is a success in itself with the right perspective. O’Hair has that right attitude—always growing, always challenging, always learning through difficult times.

Today, at Quail Hollow, the rabbit ran with the Tiger and ended up on top and victorious.

A PGA TOUR rookie in 2005 after coming through the testing of Q-School—one day shy of his 23rd birthday and in only his 18th career start, he won the John Deere Classic by the narrowest of margins—one stroke.

Then after two more solid years on tour, the stage was set for bigger and better things.

He had the 54-hole lead by two strokes over Phil Mickelson at 2007 PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass. Playing in the final group with Mickelson, he knocked two balls into the water at the famed par-3 17th island green and left with quadruple-bogey and finished 11th.

Mickelson would go on to win his first PLAYERS Championship.

He came back in 2008 with his second win at the PODS Championship on the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook. Then, earlier this year, he had a five stroke lead over Tiger Woods after 54 holes at Bay Hill in the Arnold Palmer Invitational.

Like Mickelson at THE PLAYERS, Tiger pummeled him by shooting 67 to his 73, and beat him on the last hole with a dramatic birdie putt in the twilight zone.

This time Tiger was one stroke ahead going into Sunday and O’Hair’s 69 trumped Woods’ 72, and he beat Tiger by two strokes and Bubba Watson and Lucas Glover by one stroke.

Third round leader, Zach Johnson, faltered on Sunday shooting a 76. He tripled bogeyed the par-3 second hole, and finished T11 four strokes behind the Champion O’Hair.

The 26-year old husband, father of two children with another one on the way became the first American under the age of 30 to win three times on the PGA TOUR.

“All year there's been little disappointments here and there, although I've been playing some great golf. I'll just have one bad day or one week I'll be striking the ball really well, and I'm not quite putting the putter together.

One week I'll put the putter together and then the driver is kind of leaving. It was just nice this week to have a nice solid week and close the deal.”

“Losing sucked at Bay Hill. It wasn't a matter of I didn't feel like I was going to play well after that. I knew I was going to keep playing well, I was going to keep striking the ball well, and it was just a matter of time.

It is tough to lose like that, to lose a five shot lead against obviously Tiger, you still learn a lot from it. I think it's just experience. It just gives you more and more experience. You learn from it, and it's just an experience that's going to help you become a better player.

All I have to do is keep putting myself in those situations, and at some point I'm going to learn how to win. And it's just nice to obviously win as quickly as I did after Bay Hill.”

As candid as O’Hair was about his recent Bay Hill experience, he seemed to dodge the question of what it was like to win a golf tournament with Tiger in contention down the stretch.

“I think you want to play well, you want to win golf tournaments where the best field is there—I'm not sitting there saying, oh, I beat Tiger this week. A win is a win, no matter how you look at it. It's just nice to win a golf tournament where it was a solid field this week.”

Maybe he was thinking it?

Although O’Hair bogeyed Nos. 17 and 18 on Sunday, he played the last three holes 16, 17, and 18 the “Green Mile” at Quail Hollow in even par for the week.

He did not make a putt outside of 10 feet. He won a PGA TOUR event with a deep field without making a putt longer than 10 feet.

Tiger Woods playing in his fifth tournament since returning from reconstructive left knee surgery, on the other hand, was four over par for the same three holes, though he parred them on Sunday afternoon.

He had his opportunity to charge when he drove the green on the par-4 14th. He was fortunate to walk away with a par.   
 
“I made a mistake there. I knew the green was baked out. It was downwind, and I didn't heed my own warning myself and ended up putting too hard, blocked it, and hit it too hard. Good combo. Then ran it by, and the next one I blocked again, then I made just a wonderful six-footer for a third putt.”

Woods finished 4th place alone and is headed to TPC Sawgrass this week where he won THE PLAYERS Championship in 2001.

Though not currently a Major, it is considered the 5th Major due to its deep field and annual competition on the Pete Dye Stadium Course.

Lucas Glover, a 29-year old one time PGA TOUR Champion from nearby Greenville, South Carolina, had it to 11 under par and tied with O’Hair through 16 holes, but then bogeyed the par-3 17th hole to finish T2.

“That hole eats my lunch. I think I hit an okay shot today, misjudged the wind a little bit. I thought I had a little bit more right to left. But I always hit it over there for that hole every time, and I know you can't get it up-and-down, so I think I made my four, my par.

It's a hard hole and I'm a drawer, so you've got to start it right of the green and hope it doesn't cross the flag and take a big hop and go in the soup. Under the gun, I didn't hit the right shot.”

“With the exception of the majors, World Golf Championships and maybe next week (THE PLAYERS), this might be the best field we have and I finished second, one shot out of a playoff.

I'm pretty excited about the way I played, not excited about the way it ended up. Believe it or not, I'm usually pretty nervous in the last couple groups on a Sunday, and I didn't give too much away today, so I'm proud of that.”

Bubba Watson, the 30-year old in his fourth season, finished T2 once in each of the last two years, and did it again today to make it three years straight. With prodigious length off the tee, it is a matter of time before he breaks through with his first win.  

“It was probably the best day of my golfing career. Short (career so far), but it was a great day. I didn't get mad. I just took my bad shots with pride and came back fighting with some birdies, made some good putts, made some great putts that didn't go in.

All in all it was a good day, a great week.”

It was vintage Bubba golf as he shot 70 with five birdies and three bogeys. He, like Glover, bogeyed one of the Green Mile holes No. 16 to fall short of O’Hair by one stroke at the end.

“My caddie (Ted Scott) calmed me down. We stayed focused, talked about a lot of random stuff so I could forget about my bogeys and forget about my putts that didn't go in. As a team, it was the best day that we've had in two and a half, almost three years now.

It was a great day, a good learning experience, and looking forward to the rest of my career if I can act like this.”

“I missed a bunch of cuts by one this year because I get down and I get mad and don't focus on the next hole or the next shot or whatever, and I just lose interest. This week we said, no matter what happens, let's just try to do this. It's a tough week, almost like a major, so let's just play it as a tough week. If you make a bogey, everyone is going to make a bogey, so just try to make a birdie on the next hole.

This week was a great steppingstone. We went up a little bit. We matured a little bit this week, so now we're at like two percent maturity instead of one.”

Phil Mickelson shot a Sunday 67 after a Saturday 75 to finish T5 three strokes back along with five other golfers.  

“I wasn't really even thinking about winning starting out. The course is playing very difficult. The wind is picking up and it's very challenging. I had some of the best shots of the day the last three, four holes and still was not able to make birdies.

It's a very challenging test with the wind, the firm greens. Again, I never really thought about winning until the last four or five holes.”

Mickelson won THE PLAYERS Championship in 2007 after the Stadium Course was upgraded and the first year the tournament moved to a May date on the Major Rota (April—Masters; May—PLAYERS; June—U.S. Open; July—British Open and August—PGA Championship).

“It's good momentum to go into next week. I knew I was playing well. Yesterday's round was disappointing. I wish I was out there playing in some of the latter groups with a chance to win.  I enjoyed getting a good round and hitting some good shots, making some key putts, feeling the pressure.

You know the last hole I had a four-footer and I had pressure on that. That's cool. I haven't been in a tournament the last couple weeks, and it was fun to feel that.”

Ted Purdy who is listed under “other prominent PGA TOUR members” in the 2009 Official Media Guide was in the T5 group of players with Mickelson.

“Seeing that I'm 500th in the world and I haven't had a Top 10 in a year and a half, it's a big confidence boost.”

Zach Johnson, the 2007 Masters Champion, cited medical reasons for his poor finish on Sunday.

“I don't like making excuses, but I've got a massive headache, and my vision was not great out there today, which was frustrating. But I'll learn from it certainly and figure out what happened and hopefully I'll be better the next time around.”

“I knew I was never out of it, especially on this golf course. I knew there were a lot of birdies out there, and I just had to remain patient. Actually, I didn't play that bad on the back, I just didn't score very well.

All in all, I'm playing well, I've just got to regroup and hopefully put some things together for next week.”

Timing is everything in golf, and is it a coincidence that this week’s tournament is THE PLAYERS Championship?

Perhaps O’Hair will avenge his Sunday loss on the 17th hole to Phil Mickelson.

Or perhaps he will be in a duel with the other two golfers in the world who are younger than 30 and have three or more PGA TOUR victories—2004 PLAYERS Champion Adam Scott (six) and defending PLAYERS Champion Sergio Garcia (seven).

By the way, Rory McIlroy turns 20 tomorrow (May 4th) leaving only Japan’s Ryo Ishikawa and Hawaiian and Japanese American Tadd Fujikawa as the remaining teenagers in the world with PGA TOUR experience.

O’Hair reflected back on his time at Quail Hollow.

“When I came here and I saw the rough the way it was on my first practice round, it was just a sigh of relief because this place always plays like a major, and you just don't want that kind of stress before THE PLAYERS.

I think they did a fantastic job setting up the golf course. It made it more fun for us.”

The rough is reasonable at TPC Sawgrass and the par-3 17th still has an island green, so it will be interesting to see how Sean O’Hair plays this coming week in the “fifth major”—the tournament with the deepest and most competitive field in all of golf worldwide.

Tiger, Phil, and Sergio beware—there is a hare on the loose!

Andy Reistetter is a freelance golf writer.

He follows the PGA TOUR volunteering for the tournaments and working part time for NBC Sports, CBS Sports, and The Golf Channel.

He resides in Jacksonville Beach, Florida near the PGA TOUR headquarters and home of The PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach.

He enjoys pursuing his passion for the game of golf and everything associated with it.

He can be reached through his website www.MrHickoryGolf.net or by e-mailing him to [e-mail]