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Hyo Joo Kim wins LPGA Tour's Founders Cup

Hyo Joo Kim birdied five of the last eight holes to outlast Stacy Lewis on Sunday at Desert Ridge in the JTBC Founders Cup

John Nicholson (The Jakarta Post)
Phoenix
Mon, March 23, 2015

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Hyo Joo Kim wins LPGA Tour's Founders Cup

Hyo Joo Kim birdied five of the last eight holes to outlast Stacy Lewis on Sunday at Desert Ridge in the JTBC Founders Cup.

The 19-year-old Kim closed with a 5-under 67, holing a 10-foot birdie putt on the par-4 18th to beat Lewis by three strokes for her second LPGA Tour title.

The third-ranked Lewis shot a 68. She pulled within a stroke with a birdie on the par-4 16th, but three-putted for bogey on 18.

Projected to jump from eighth to fourth in the world, Kim finished at 21-under 267 at Wildfire Golf Club. She won the Evian Championship last year in France for first major title and has eight victories on the South Korean tour.

Kim is the fifth South Korean winner in the first six events this year '€” and the other winner, top-ranked Lydia Ko, was born in South Korea.

Kim bogeyed the par-4 10th after driving under a tree that had a beehive. She was denied relief from the bees, hit her second to the fairway and failed to get up-and-down for par.

She rebounded with birdies on Nos. 11-13 '€” holing putts of 5, 50 and 3 feet '€” and matched Lewis' birdie on the par-5 15th to remain two strokes ahead.

On the 18th, Kim hit a perfect drive and put her 140-yard approach pin-high to the right of the difficult pin placed over the large left-side bunker and in front of a rear falloff.

Lewis drove into a sand-filled divot on the left side of the fairway, making it almost impossible to clear the bunker and stop the ball near the pin. She ended up 30 feet away at the back of the green and missed a 4 1/2-foot comebacker.

Lewis won the 2013 tournament and has 11 LPGA Tour titles. The 30-year-old Texan finished second for the second time this year and the 17th time in her career.

South Korea's Ilhee Lee (66) and Mi Hyang Lee (68) and Thailand's Pornanong Phatlum (67) tied for third at 16 under.

Ko had her third straight 69 to tie for sixth at 15 under. The 17-year-old New Zealander has broken par in her last 24 LPGA Tour rounds and 27 worldwide, a streak that started in the first round of her victory last year in the season-ending event.

Ko won the Women's Australian Open and the Ladies European Tour's New Zealand Women's Open in consecutive weeks this year. In her other three LPGA Tour starts, she tied for second in Florida in the opener, tied for seventh in the Bahamas and was second in Singapore.

Anna Nordqvist (64), Austin Ernst (65), Sei Young Kim (65), Na Yeon Choi (66) matched Ko at 15 under. Nordqvist, the former Arizona State player from Sweden, had the best round of the day. She birdied nine of the first 15 holes, missed an eagle putt on 15 and bogeyed 17.

Alison Lee, the 20-year-old former UCLA player who matched the course record with a 63 on Saturday, had a 74 to tie for 24th at 11 under.

Karrie Webb, the 2011 and 2014 winner, finished with a 69 to tie for 34th at 9 under. Michelle Wie tied for 64th at 4 under after a 71. (***)

 

 

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