By John Strege
Retief Goosen is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, a winner of two U.S. Opens, who early in his PGA Tour Champions career largely had failed to burnish those credentials. That was not an issue in the final round of the Hoag Classic on Sunday.

Goosen, 53, starting the final round one shot back of fellow South African Ernie Els, got off to a Hall of Fame start by playing the first three holes in four-under par at Newport Beach (Calif.) Country Club, shot an eight-under 63 and cruised to a four-stroke victory, only his second win in 62 career starts on the senior tour.

“It’s been a bit of a struggle,” Goosen said. “Struggled with a bad shoulder a little bit last year. Surgery in the off season really helped. Shoulder feeling great. Worked a little on the mental side, too. From the start of the season felt I was hitting the ball pretty good, I just needed to get the putter going.”

On a beautiful day on the Southern California coast, Goosen began his round not needing his putter. He holed his second shot from the first fairway for an eagle two, then birdied the second and third holes en route to a front-nine five-under par 30. He opened a four-shot lead on the front, increased it to five with a birdie at 10, and led by at least three the rest of the afternoon.

Goosen finished with a 54-hole total of 15-under par 198. His one previous senior victory came in the 12th start of his rookie season, in the Bridgestone Senior Players Championship.

Interestingly, the final grouping included three players with a combined six U.S. Open victories — two each by Goosen, Els and Lee Janzen. Els, the defending champion, was undone by four bogeys on his first eight holes, shot a two-over 73 and finished seventh. Janzen shot a two-under 69 and tied for third.

K.J. Choi, who closed with a 66, finished second.

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By John Strege
Jim Furyk needed no introduction, of course, but he emphatically made his presence known anyway by winning his PGA Tour Champions debut in the tour’s return from a five-month COVID-19 hiatus.

Nearly three months after turning 50, Furyk shot a four-under-par 68 at Warwick Hills C.C. in Grand Blanc, Mich., on Sunday to win the Ally Challenge by two. His 54-hole total of 14-under-par 202 was two better than another senior rookie, Brett Quigley, and Retief Goosen.

Furyk became the 19th player in tour history to win in his debut and the first since Miguel Angel Jimenez in 2014. He also became the third rookie to win in 2020, joining Quigley and Ernie Els, and forming a potentially dominant nucleus of newcomers to the senior circuit.

It was a surprise to no one that Furyk prevailed, principally because he remains competitive on the PGA Tour from which he likely has forged a World Golf Hall of Fame career. He came into the Ally Challenge 92nd in the World Ranking. The senior closest to him in the ranking was Els at 477th.

Furyk, who won 17 times on the PGA Tour, has made the cut in three of his last five PGA Tour starts, most recently at the Memorial, where he tied for 48th. He is only 16 months removed from finishing second in the Players Championship, and he is in the field at the PGA Championship at the TPC Harding Park in San Francisco this week.

He began play on Sunday in second place, trailing Quigley by a stroke, a deficit that grew to two on the front nine. But he pulled even on the 10th hole with a birdie to Quigley’s bogey.

Goosen, with birdies on Nos. 14, 16 and 17, joined the duo atop the leader board, but bogeyed 18.

Furyk and Quigley arrived at the 17th hole tied for the lead, but the latter bogeyed the final two holes by missing the greens in each instance. Furyk, meanwhile, missed only one of 18 greens in regulation and hit 13 of 14 fairways.

No doubt, his fellow senior competitors are wishing Fuyrk only the best of luck at the PGA at Harding Park. With a good finish, they can only hope, perhaps he won’t feel the need to come back and visit them any time soon.

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By John Strege
It won’t be known for a while, but if the Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai is a harbinger of the PGA Tour Champions’ season ahead, it will be a memorable one.

Four World Golf Hall of Famers were tied for the lead at one point on the back nine at Hualalai Golf Club on the Big Island of Hawaii on Saturday, but it was an interloper, Miguel Angel Jimenez, who emerged the victor in a playoff with Ernie Els and Fred Couples.

Jimenez, 56, holed a 12-foot birdie putt on the second playoff hole to win the event for the second time.

Early on the back nine, Els, Couples, Bernhard Langer and Retief Goosen, all World Golf Hall of Famers, were tied for the lead at 12-under. Goosen was first to bow out by running out of holes and tied for fourth. Langer was next to go when his tee shot at the par-3 17th got caught in the wind and drifted left and onto the lava. He eventually made a double-bogey there and bogeyed the 18th to fall to a tie for sixth.

Couples faltered on the first playoff hole when he missed a three-foot putt for par, leaving Jimenez and Els the last men standing.

Els, perhaps, came up one day short. Senior events — other than the senior majors — are 54-hole affairs and as such are more a sprint than a marathon. He nervously stumbled in his first round, shooting a 72, which put him eight shots back of the lead.

“From the first day it was pretty disappointing,” Els said. “I was almost last in the field. Then I got myself back up and played some really good golf. Disappointing obviously. I would have loved to got it through, but I had a couple of chances, didn’t quite get the right speed or the right line.”

Els played his way into contention with consecutive 65s on the weekend to get into a playoff with Couples and the interloper, Jimenez, who is not in the World Golf Hall of Fame. Many would argue, however, that he is a Hall of Famer of some sorts, given his popularity and renown in golf circles as the most interesting man in the world.

Jimenez, who shot a final-round 68 for a 54-hole total of 14-under par 202, caught a huge break on the par-3 17th. His tee shot went left and bounded off the lava and back into a bunker from which he was able to save par.

“I was very, very lucky there,” he said.

The PGA Tour Champions was fortunate, too, to open its season with a show featuring a star-studded cast.

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By John Strege
Scott McCarron won the season-long Charles Schwab Cup points race and its $1 million prize on Sunday while holding a glass of wine and watching on a clubhouse television.

More precisely, Jeff Maggert won it for him.

“Are you kidding me?” McCarron said when he saw Maggert hole out his second shot from the fairway on the third playoff hole to defeat Retief Goosen and win the Charles Schwab Cup Championship, the PGA Tour Champions season finale.

Had Goosen won the tournament, he also would have won the Schwab Cup points race. He would have been looking at a four-footer for birdie had Maggert not delivered a hole-out eagle from 123 yards on the 17th hole at Phoenix Country Club.

“He [McCarron] owes me some red wine or something,” Maggert said. “Congrats to Scott. He played some great golf this year. Hats off to him.”

No chance was the most likely chance that Goosen had of winning the season-long Schwab Cup before the week began. The 50-year-old World Golf Hall of Famer needed to win the tournament and for McCarron, the points leader going in, to finish in a three-way tie for 12th or worse. Additionally, Jerry Kelly, second in points, had to finish tied for fifth or worse.

McCarron, who led the Schwab Cup points standings for most of the year, cooperated by finishing in a tie for 27th. And Kelly did, too, by tying for 12th. But Goosen’s putter and Maggert did not cooperate.

Goosen closed with a seven-under-par 64 on Sunday that included three birdies in his final four holes to get into a playoff. He could have won that playoff on the first extra hole, but missed a four-foot birdie putt for the victory.

With darkness encroaching and threatening to send the playoff to a Monday finish, Goosen hit his approach shot from a bunker to the 17th green to four feet.

Maggert’s approach landed a few feet short of the hole and the ball bounced into the cup, setting off a wild celebration in the clubhouse.

Right. On. Target. ?

From the middle of the fairway! ?

@Jeff_Maggert has won the @SchwabCupFinale! ? pic.twitter.com/nfg2BxmjYJ

— PGA TOUR Champions (@ChampionsTour) November 11, 2019

The celebration would soon be joined by Maggert, 55, who won for the first time since 2015. It was his sixth PGA Tour Champions victory.

“I’ve seen it happen, but I never I thought it would happen to me in my life,” Maggert said. “Obviously, I didn’t make a lot of putts last two days, but sometimes you don’t need the putter to win.”

McCarron’s reaction in addition to his clubhouse celebration? “Jeff Maggert, my favourite player on the PGA Tour Champions.”

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Goosen had just hit his approach from a fairway bunker to four feet on the par-4 17th, the third playoff hole. If the 50-year-old World Golf Hall of Famer won the playoff, he would take both prizes. Maggert faced an approach shot in the fairway from 123 yards. All that was on the line for him was the tournament title. And if Maggert beat Goosen to win it, it meant Scott McCarron—watching intently back in the clubhouse—would win the points race and collect the $1 million reward for the winner.

Knowing he needed to hit one tight to keep up with Goosen, Maggert set dead aim on the flag. And, well, this happened:

A playoff hole-out for the win. ?

Jeff Maggert drains his approach for eagle on the third extra hole to win the Charles Schwab Cup Championship.pic.twitter.com/vvIkInzpeW

— Golf Digest (@GolfDigest) November 11, 2019

Two bounces and then the dunk. It clinched Maggert’s sixth career PGA Tour Champions win but his first since 2015. And it allowed McCarron, who had finished a disappointing 27th in the tournament, to claim the year-long title after leading in the standings for the majority of 2019.

Suffice to say, McCarron is likely to send Maggert a little holiday present in the very near future.

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By John Strege
The inevitable prevailed over the unlikely in the Bridgestone Senior Players Championship on Sunday, when Retief Goosen finally won on the PGA Tour Champions and 65-year-old Jay Haas’ bid to win came up two strokes short.

Goosen, a World Golf Hall of Fame member with two U.S. Open victories on his resume, birdied the final two holes at Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, the margin of victory over Haas and Tim Petrovic.

“It was an up-and-down year so far,” Goosen said, “and I had my chances a few weeks ago and didn’t do it. It’s nice to pull this one off.”

Goosen, 50, had been closing in on his maiden senior win, hence the inevitability. In his last four starts, he was fourth at the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship, tied for 11th at the Principal Charity Classic, tied for second in the American Family Insurance Championship and tied for 14th in the U.S. Senior Open.

An unlikely winner would have been Haas, given his age and the fact that his last of 18 senior wins came three years ago. Yet Haas was one of five tied for the lead at four-under par midway through the round and was the leader in the clubhouse when he completed his round of three-under par 67.

Petrovic, who shot a two-under 68, joined Haas in the clubhouse at four-under par and waiting to see whether it would be good enough for a playoff opportunity.

It wasn’t. Goosen saved par from a back bunker at the par-5 16th hole, then birdied 17 with a 4-iron tee shot, a 7-iron second to 10 feet, and a perfect putt to take the lead at five-under par. At 18, he hit a perfect drive, an iron to eight feet and holed the putt to win by two.

Goosen began the day one off the lead and shot a two-under par 68 for a 72-hole score of six-under 274.

“I knew it was going to play tough for everybody and I just had to hang in there,” he said. “I thought after the bogey at the first, here we go again, but I had a nice driver, 4-iron on the second and made a nice eagle there. It sort of settled me down and from there I was just trying to hang on.”

Scott Parel, the 54-hole leader, and Kent Jones were the others tied for the lead on the back nine. Parel double-bogeyed 17 and Jones bogeyed 15 and 18 and they tied for fourth.

Goosen receives $450,000 for the victory and a spot in the PGA Tour’s Players Championship next March.

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By Joel Beall
CARMEL, Calif. — Words like “vision” and “perseverance” often are used in golf, describing a gritty round or bounce-back effort from a slump. And book it, those words will be used to describe this week’s U.S. Open winner in some fashion. While true to varying degrees, those words are personified by the five newest members to the World Golf Hall of Fame.

Retief Goosen, Billy Payne, Jan Stephenson, Peggy Kirk Bell and Dennis Walters were enshrined Monday night in a ceremony at Sunset Center in Carmel-by-the-Sea. Though all blessed with talents in their respective roles, it was those tenets of fortitude and creativity that spurred them to greatness.

With more than 30 fellow Hall of Famers on hand, the inductees spoke of the influences that brought them to this honour.

Payne, who earned his place via the Lifetime Achievement category, is best known as the former chairman of Augusta National Golf Club. In his position, Payne was the first to admit female members to the club, in 2012, and oversaw upgrades to the press building, practice and patron facilities and Berckmans Place. Innovation that strengthened the brands of the club and the Masters.

Payne, who helped bring the Olympics to Atlanta in 1996, also led efforts to grow the game with the Drive, Chip and Putt National Championship, Asia-Pacific Amateur and Latin America Amateur initiatives. But Payne deferred the spotlight, putting it back on the club he loves so dear.

“I know I am the outlier,” Payne said. “Let’s be clear: it’s Augusta National Golf Club being honoured tonight.”

As for his motivation? His wife, Martha, who Payne attributed all his successes and triumphs. “Without her, none of this is possible.”

Goosen is famous for his two U.S. Open victories, but that hardly encapsulates his career. He won 33 times around the world and was consistently a competitor at the sport’s biggest stages with 16 top-10s at major championships. The 50-year-old made five Presidents Cup teams in his career and represented South Africa five times at the World Cup.

All accomplished after surviving a lightning strike when he was 15.

“You don’t know where you’re going to wake up when that happens,” Goosen said of the near-death experience. “Three weeks later, I was back on the golf course, and here we are.” Then adding some levity to the moment, Goosen joked, “I think the lightning really struck something in me, I started to play some real good golf.”

Stephenson won three majors and 41 worldwide wins. But her legacy was built outside the ropes just as much as it was in.

She was the key figure (literally and figuratively) in an LPGA marketing campaign the leaned on players’ looks. Though her embracement of this tactic was somewhat controversial and drew detractors, Stephenson was a primary reason the tour was able to gain new and financially-sound sponsors.

“To now be counted with fellow LPGA friends who are World Golf Hall of Fame members is both an honor and very humbling,” Stephenson said.

Kirk Bell, who died in 2016, was one of the pioneers of the women’s game, helping form the first professional tour with Babe Zaharias and others. She won the Titleholders Championship (once considered a major) and the North and South Women’s Amateur, and represented the U.S. in the 1950 Curtis Cup. With her husband Warren (Bullet) Bell, the two purchased and ran Pine Needles until Bullet’s death in 1984. She was the winner of the USGA’s Bob Jones Award in 1990 and an inductee into seven halls of fame, but it was as a teacher that she made her greatest contribution.

After starting one of the country’s first golf schools at Pine Needles, she began running five-day group lessons she called “Golfaris” for women to learn the game. More than 20,000 women went through the program.

Walters, a recent recipient of the USGA’s Bob Jones Award, said he was overwhelmed when receiving his induction news from Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player. “I can’t walk, but when I got the call, I felt like I could fly,” Walters said.

Walters was an elite amateur when he was paralyzed in a car accident at 24. Resolute in continuing his relationship with the sport, Walters had a customized wheelchair built to accommodate his love of the game.

He began to host clinics, starting with the 1977 PGA Merchandise Show, built around performance (Walters mastered a number of trick shots) and inspiration, telling his story of perseverance and chasing his dream. He has appeared in over 3,000 golf clinics, including a number of television shows. Walters is just one of 11 honorary lifetime members of the PGA of America.

“Ben Hogan watched me hit golf balls, Sam Snead told me dirty jokes, and Byron Nelson was once standing so close I had to tell him to back off,” Walters joked.

And though he was the first speaker of the night, his words proved an apt summary of the night’s theme.

“Never let anyone tell you your dream is impossible,” Walters said.

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Each of the four living inductees (Kirk Bell died in 2016 at age 95) were notified via phone on Tuesday.

“I was standing on the putting green hitting a few putts and then this number rings, which I didn’t recognize, but thought maybe I’d pick it up, and it was Gary Player on the phone,” Goosen said. “It’s always great hearing Gary’s voice, but he sounded extremely excited, and when he told me, yeah, I sounded very excited. So it was a great moment, and I felt shaky after that. Missed a lot of putts, but it was very exciting.”

Goosen, a South African native, won a combined 19 PGA Tour and European Tour events, and 33 worldwide tournaments during his professional career. His most noted victories came in the 2001 and 2004 U.S. Opens. He also played on six International teams in the Presidents Cup and was twice the European Tour Order of Merit winner in 2001 and 2002.

Retief Goosen.
Photo: TIMOTHY A. CLARY

After winning the 1949 Titleholders Championship as an amateur, Kirk Bell was a charter member of the LPGA who went on to become a renowned golf instructor and the matriarch of Pine Needles Lodge and Mid Pines Inn and Golf Club in Southern Pines, N.C. Before her passing, she got to see Pine Needles host three highly successful U.S. Women’s Opens in 1996, 2001 and 2007.

Peggy Kirk-Bell

Stephenson joined the LPGA Tour from her native Australia in 1974 and immediately made a mark on and off the course. She earned rookie of the year honours but also became famous for embracing her good looks and using them to help market herself—including famously posing naked in a bathtub, covered by a pile of golf balls. Her record, however, was something that marketed itself: among her 16 LPGA titles and 20 worldwide wins were three major titles (1981 du Maurier Classic, 1982 LPGA Championship and 1983 U.S. Women’s Open.

Jan Stephenson.
Photo: Focus On Sport

“I was crying when Nancy Lopez called me yesterday because I knew she was going to tell me I didn’t make it again, and I didn’t hear her when she said I made it because she started the conversation the same way … two years ago, she said, ‘I know you’ve worked so hard for the LPGA but you didn’t make it.’ So she started exactly the same way yesterday, ‘I know you’ve worked really hard’ and so I started crying. And then she said, ‘But this time you’ve been recognized and you’ve made it.’ I’ve been crying, goosebump, couldn’t sleep. It was like winning the U.S. Open all over again.”

In his 11 years as chairman of Augusta National and the Masters Tournament (2006-2017), Payne oversaw a series of initiatives aimed at broadening the appeal of the sport to grow the game in the U.S. and around the world. He helped establish premier amateur tournaments in Asia and Latin America that gave the winners invitations into the Masters in an attempt to create golf heroes in those regions. He also helped establish the Drive, Chip and Putt National Championship hosted at Augusta National the Sunday prior to the Masters. And in 2012, he oversaw the admission of the first female members into Augusta National.

Former Masters chairman Billy Payne.
Photo: Rob Carr

Walters was a talented golfer whose life took a harrowing turn when he was paralysed at age 24 in a golf cart accident. But it didn’t prevent him from staying involved in the game, as he would go on to perform thousands of golf clinics around the world, becoming an iconic figure to many fans for his trick shots as well as his lessons on life.

Dennis Walters
Photo: Jim Rogash

“Everybody has a story of how they got here, but I think my story is probably the most unlikely journey to get to any type of Hall of Fame that anyone’s ever done,” Walters said. “I was laying in a hospital bed 44 years ago, and I never thought I was actually getting out of that bed. I’ve done so many things I’ve never thought were possible, but it also gives me the opportunity to show others what’s possible.”

Goosen and Stephenson gained entry as male and female competitors, while Bell, Payne and Walters were all nominated through the lifetime achievement category. Their additions bring the total number of Hall of Fame members to 160.

The five were among a group of 15 finalists that included Graham Marsh, Corey Pavin, Hal Sutton, Susie Maxwell Berning, Beverly Hanson, Sandra Palmer, Dottie Pepper, Jim Ferrier, Catherine Lacoste and Calvin Peete.

The official induction ceremony is June 10, 2019, the Monday prior to the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach.

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