Make an ace, win a Lambo – sounds like a sweet deal.
The ace that won Austin Ernst a two-year lease on a Lamborghini on Monday wasn’t caught on camera. But every shot that’s struck on the par-3 12th during competition rounds of the LPGA Tour’s Pelican Women’s Championship will be streamed live on NBC’s Peacock. It marks the first-ever Featured Hole stream in LPGA history.
“Apparently a lot of people came close on Monday,” said Ernst, who struck an 8-iron from 147 yards at the Pelican Golf Club in Belleair, Florida. Any player who follows Ernst’s lead the rest of the week will also win a two-year lease on the iconic Italian car.
Ernst said she hadn’t gotten the information yet on how much the insurance will run her for two years. That number will determine whether or not it makes sense to accept the prize.
Back home in South Carolina, Ernst drives a Chevy Tahoe, and she was relieved to hear that the Lamborghini is an automatic as she has yet to learn how to drive a manual.
“I was like wait, I can’t drive a stick,” said Ernst. “Probably shouldn’t learn how to drive on that car either.”
Raymond James Pro-Am ahead of the 2021 Pelican Women’s Championship at Pelican Golf Club in Belleair, FL on Monday, November 8, 2021.
(Ben Solomon/Outlyr)
Live stream coverage of the 12th hole will feature live interviews by Amy Rogers and studio coverage from host George Savaricas and analyst Jim Gallagher. Coverage of the watery par 3 will begin at 7:45 a.m. ET on Thursday and Friday and 9:45 a.m. ET over the weekend. It will be free to consumers on the Peacock app.
Television coverage of the Pelican will be live on Golf Channel from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Thursday and Friday. Weekend coverage will be tape-delayed on Golf Channel from 7:30-10:30 p.m.
The event’s live stream times on the NBC Sports App and golfchannel.com are from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. on Thursday and Friday, and 1-4 p.m. over the weekend.
“I loved the competition. The game, I learned to love it later.”
Danielle Kang has put together quite the resume since taking down Jessica Korda more than a decade ago on her way to winning the 2010 U.S. Women’s Amateur. But three years before her match-play triumph at Charlotte (North Carolina) Country Club, the California native was pushed into 2007 U.S. Women’s Open qualifying without even knowing it. Her brother signed her up and then Kang did the unthinkable: advanced through local and sectional qualifying to earn a spot in the field at Pine Needles Lodge and Golf Club.
She was 14 years old at the time and oh yeah – had only picked up a golf club for the first time a year and a half earlier.
“I loved the competition. The game, I learned to love it later.” Kang told podcast host Hally Leadbetter. “I was good at it, which made me like it. I probably learned to really love golf in the last four or five years.
“I felt that golf was sometimes taking things away from me, but then I realized that it has given me so many opportunities.”
Danielle Kang reacts to missing a putt on the ninth green during competition rounds of the Solheim Cup golf tournament at Inverness Club. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-USA TODAY Sports
Since the start of her rookie season in 2012, Kang has won five times on the LPGA tour, including her lone major victory at the 2017 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship (her first win on tour).
She’s represented the United States at the last three Solheim Cups, as well as the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games where she finished T-20.
On the heels of her two-win year in 2020 (LPGA Drive On Championship, Marathon LPGA Classic presented by Dana), she’s yet to hoist hardware in 2021 despite nine top-10 finishes in 19 starts.
Three wins in six starts? That’d be pretty damn good.
Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Jin Young Ko leads an LPGA event going into the final round. She’s once again right in the mix, this time leading the Cognizant Founders Cup by four shots over others who will look to go low on Sunday. Ko is just one week removed from failing to force a playoff at the ShopRite LPGA Classic, no doubt adding to her fire at Mountain Ridge Country Club this weekend.
She started her round with a dropped shot on four, but bounced right back with back-to-back birdies on five and six. She would make the turn with an even-par 35. Her back nine was flawless, carding two birdies and no bogeys for a day total 2-under 69.
In a tie for second is the U.S. Women’s Open champion Yuka Saso, who fired a 4-under 67 in Saturday’s third round. Saso hasn’t finished outside the top 40 since her major victory (seven starts), a stretch that includes three top 5s. She got this left-to-right breaker to go for her fourth birdie of the day.
Here comes the @uswomensopen champ 👀 @SasoYuka_315 sneaks one in through the side door to move within two of the lead
World No. 1 Nelly Korda sits just outside the top five at 7 under, T-6. Back-to-back bogeys in the middle of her second nine stopped her from getting close before Sunday’s final round. But she is the best player in the world for a reason, don’t be surprised if she makes a run.
Lexi Thompson and Maria Fassi also sit 7 under, T-6.
A group of six sit T-11, seven shots back of Ko. Some of those names include Jessica Korda, Jeongeun Lee6, and Brooke Henderson.
“In some ways, it will be mourning a loss, but in other ways having a sponsor like Chevron who has really been committed will be great,” said Alcott, who won the major championship three times and started the tradition of the winner jumping into the lake at Mission Hills Country Club after her 1988 victory.
Sadness for the Coachella Valley but an understanding that the tournament might be bigger and better in a new location and with sponsorship from Chevron seemed to be the overwhelming reaction to Tuesday’s announcement that the tournament once hosted by Dinah Shore will relocate to Houston in 2023.
“I have a deep love for the event, “said Gabe Codding, the director of marketing for the City of Rancho Mirage who starting working seasonally at the LPGA event in 1996 and worked up to tournament director from 2008 to 2017. “So to see, to know that the event can go to where it started from (in status) and get back to where it needed to be is an incredible feeling. And then absolutely gutted that it is leaving our destination and Poppie’s Pond and Mission Hills. So it’s very conflicting and very hard to process for me personally.”
While he was tournament director, Codding helped with the sponsorship transition from Nabisco to Kraft and then from Kraft to All Nippon Airways. He said the event coordinator side of him understands the need for the LPGA to move the event.
“It’s a North American, U.S. based company,” Codding said of Chevron. “It’s a dream come true.”
Nicole Castrale has two connections with the Rancho Mirage tournament. She first saw the event when she was 15 years old and a top golfer at Palm Desert High School, with her coach and local golf professional Vern Frazer telling her this tournament was what they were working for. Castrale did make it to the LPGA and played in the major championship eight times starting in 2007.
“That was my goal, playing in it, especially it being in my hometown, being that young,” Castrale said Tuesday while on a trip to Greece. “Seeing Juli Inkster, she was a role model to me, and now we are friends. So all through high school and college, I wanted to play in the event in my backyard.”
Castrale was a winner on the LPGA and played on two Solheim Cup teams, but she never won a major before back issues forced her off the tour. She sees the move of the tournament as both good and bad for the LPGA.
“It is a tough spot, because there are the players who are going to be saddened with history coming to an end, but on the flip side, this is their job, and in a small way this is a little promotion,” said Castrale, who now works in real estate at Toscana Country Club in Indian Wells. “They have a sponsor who appears to be completely backing them and giving them the opportunity that they may not have if they couldn’t find another sponsor.”
Introducing Castrale and every other player on the first tee of the Dinah Shore Tournament Course for the last 22 years has been desert radio personality Rich Gilgallon, who was surprised by the news Tuesday.
“I’m devastated for the community and for the club, and I’m personally devastated,” Gilgallon said.
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Gilgallon said he has become friends on the first tee with many players, from Joanne Carner in his first year to Pat Bradley, who shares a New England background with Gillgallon, to Annika Sorenstam, who always wanted to know what was on the card Gilgallon was about to read introducing her.
“I count it as one of the great blessings of my life, really,” he said.
He added that the tournament has still been about original hostess Dinah Shore in recent years.
“I realize it wasn’t called the Dinah Shore, but it was played on Dinah Shore Avenue on the Dinah Shore Course,” he said. “I am sad for that as well, that the legacy didn’t weigh a little more heavily with the sponsor.”
Alcott said the idea that a multibillion dollar company like Chevron sponsoring an LPGA event shows how the LPGA has changed in recent years.
“I remember hearing the adage that women’s golf is sold, and men’s golf is bought,” Alcott said. “And now I think we are getting into a place where women’s golf, because it is exciting, it is global, women’s golf is being bought. People are seeing the value of it.”
As a member at Mission Hills, Alcott said she still senses support for the event locally.
“I sense the members really do want it. Everything changes, but I do sense the members do want it,” Alcott said. “I see the condition of the course, it is in really good shape during the event. I haven’t noticed a change. I have noticed the continued enthusiasm for the event.
“So I think that would be very hard for some people and maybe there will be members who will say great, it’s great to have our course back in April,” she added. “It will run the gambit.”
The financial woes of All Nippon Airways also were a contributing factor in the tournament moving after next year, Codding said. As an international airline, ANA has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and has seen revenues dry up.
“You look at poor ANA with a global pandemic. When we were in negotiation for their second renewal of the contract (a three-year extension through 2022), that was the one thing they were worried about, something semi-catastrophic that just deeply impacts their business and having that much liability, long-term liability,” Codding said.
Castrale said it will be difficult to consider the Chevron Championship as the logical extension of what was once the Colgate Dinah Shore Winner’s Circle.
“The major that we have known and the major that I strived to play in when I was 15 and wanted to have the opportunity to play in, that goal of mine, is not the same,” Castrale said. “But Chevron has now created an opportunity for the next generation to create new memories.”
Larry Bohannan is The Desert Sun golf writer, he can be reached at larry.bohannan@desertsun.com or (760) 778-4633. Follow him on Facebook or on Twitter at @larry_Bohannan. Support local journalism. Subscribe to The Desert Sun.
This would be Jin Young Ko’s third win in five starts
The LPGA is in New Jersey this week for the ShopRite LPGA Classic at Seaview’s Bay course and two of the game’s biggest names are tied for the lead. Inbee Park and Jin Young Ko both sit at 11 under, two shots clear of the next challenger.
Park had it going on the greens, carding seven birdies, along with one bogey, for a 6-under 65. She’s looking for her first win since late March 2021, despite having six top-10 finishes during that stretch.
Ko shot the same score as Park on Saturday, but she did it without carding a bogey. A flawless 65 has put her in position to win for the third time in five starts. Her most recent triumph came at the Cambia Portland Classic just a few weeks ago.
(Photo by Steve Dykes/Getty Images)
Other big names in the mix include 2021 ANA Inspiration champion Patty Tavatanakit (9 under, 3rd), 13-time LPGA winner Stacy Lewis (-6, T-10), 10-time winner Brooke Henderson (6 under, T-10), Maria Fassi (5 under, T-16), and 2021 U.S. Women’s Open champion Yuka Saso (5 under, T-16).
Pajaree Anannarukarn, Gemma Dryburgh and Carlota Ciganda sit atop the leaderboard after the first round.
The Oregon Golf Club in West Linn, Oregon, is hosting the LPGA Tour this week for the Cambia Portland Classic.
Pajaree Anannarukarn, Gemma Dryburgh and Carlota Ciganda are tied atop the leaderboard after the first round.
Anannarukarn played a nearly flawless round with just one bogey on the card, offset by five birdies for an opening 4-under 68.
Dryburgh had a more up-and-down day compared to her fellow co-leaders. She carded three bogeys, but those were erased with five birdies and an eagle. The big bird came on the par 4 7th.
Ciganda made a boatload of birdies during her round today (seven), but they were neutralized by a bogey on two and a double on 14.
World No. 2 Jin Young Yo is just one shot back, sitting at 3 under. United States Solheim Cupper Jennifer Kupcho struggled throughout the day, ending her round with a 1-over 73.
Brooke Henderson ended a victory drought that dated back to June 2019 in show-stopping fashion.
The winningest Canadian player in history returned to her winning ways at the Hugel-Air Premia LA Open. Brooke Henderson ended a victory drought that dated back to June 2019 in show-stopping fashion, toppling No. 1-ranked Jin Young Ko, Jessica Korda and Hannah Green at historic Wilshire Country Club with a closing 67.
The victory gives 23-year-old Henderson her 10th career victory, tying Ariya Jutanugarn, Shanshan Feng and Paula Creamer among active players. With golf courses closed in Henderson’s native Ontario until at least May 20 due to COVID-19 restrictions, the victory at last gave some of Henderson’s biggest supporters reason to smile back home.
“I think as I age I’m getting more nerves,” said Henderson when it was over.
Henderson, who finished at 16-under 268, looked anything but nervous when she hit a gutsy pitch on the closing par-3 18th to keep her one-shot cushion over Korda, who knocked it in close for birdie to finish solo second.
“That would be hard to pull off if she was by herself on Tuesday,” marveled Golf Channel analyst Judy Rankin of the deft up-and-down Henderson pulled off on the 72nd hole.
Sparked by a stuffed approach on the 11th and a chip-in for birdie on the 12th, Henderson started the day four strokes back of Korda but opened up a three-shot lead with four to play over Ko, Korda and Aussie Hannah Green.
Korda, winner of the season-opening Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions, had plenty of chances down the stretch but several misfires with wedge in hand, plus a bogey on the drivable par-4 14th and a par on the reachable par-5 15th, kept her from collecting another trophy.
As the tour heads to Asia for events in Singapore and Thailand, both Jessica and Nelly Korda, two of the hottest players in the game this season, will have three weeks off.
“Really frustrating, really couldn’t get anything going,” said Korda. “I was hitting it really good and then just it wasn’t happening for me for some reason.
“Just kept getting screwed and the wind kept dropping and then coming back up and we were – we just – it just wasn’t happening. I don’t know.”
Green carded a final-round 66 that included an eagle on the 14th to vault into a share of third.
Henderson came into the week with a pair of top-10 finishes on the season and hasn’t had her father/coach Dave on the road with her since January 2020. The Hendersons travel often with their two daughters, particularly at big events.
With dad back home in Smiths Falls, Ontario, they’ve used FaceTime to keep on track. Big sister Brittany helps too, particularly on the greens. Henderson noted after Friday’s round that she finally felt comfortable with the putter.
“I felt like I was playing really great golf,” said Henderson of the nearly two-year drought. “It just wasn’t my time. God has a plan for everything, and just really happy. Brit and I been working really hard, and so it’s nice to get the win and get some confidence back.”
Angela Stanford, 43, had a roller-coaster round that had her within two shots early in the back nine after a holed bunker shot on the 11th. A double-bogey on the 12th, however, took her out of the conversation down the stretch on Saturday. A closing 70 put the assistant Solheim Cup captain in a share of fifth.
USC grad Tiffany Chan played so much golf at Wilshire in college that she considered the club her second home. Chan posted a career-best tie for eighth this week thanks to a closing 69.
UCLA grad Alison Lee Monday-qualified for the LA Open with a closing eagle. After a third-round 79 send her tumbling down the board, the former Solheim Cup player carded five consecutive birdies on the back nine to shoot 66 and finished tied for 39th in her second start of the season.
