Saturday, January 31, 2009

Go, Go, Sarah Oh--Again!

Just like last weekend, it's shaping up to be another Sarah Oh-Katherine Hull showdown on the ALPG, this time in the final round of the inaugural New Zealand Women's Open. Hull had a 3-shot advantage after the 1st round, thanks to a smashing 65, but Oh responded with her 2nd-stright 68 today to open up a 2-shot lead of her own. Kiwi-centric tv highlights aren't focusing on that story, of course; the NZ media is too busy rooting for the home team. But with the ALPG site down due to heavy traffic, there's not much else to pass along right now, besides this recent profile of Oh. More later!

[Update 1 (5:25 pm): OK, the ALPG site is back. Here's their round 2 game story. Oh actually had a 67, not a 68, as originally reported. Hull bogeyed 17 and 18 to drop 3 back. Here are the results after 36 holes. You'll note that the LET's Nocera, the KLPGA's Park, and the LPGA's Kemp are also within 5 shots of Oh, and such relatively big names as Wendy Doolan and Martina Eberl are not too far behind, while the LPGA's Mollie Fankhauser and Sarah-Jane Smith (formerly Kenyon) and LET's Lotta Wahlin and Yuki Sakurai are. But at least they're doing better than worldwide young guns Sunny Park, Kiran Matharu, Anne-Lise Caudal, and Stephanie Na, not to mention LPGAers Laura Davies, Beth Bader, and Diana D'Alessio. If you have the time and the interest this Super Bowl weekend, you can follow the live scoring from your home later tonight!]

[Update 2 (2/1/09, 12:37 pm): Too bad! Oh blew up with an 80 to fall back to T6 at -1 with Mollie Fankhauser, while Katherine Hull's 76 dropped her into a T2 with Nikki Garrett, Sarah Kemp, and Bo Bea Park at -2, 6 shots behind Gwladys Nocera, who won going away with a 69. Yuki Sakurai ended up T14 with Cecelia Cho, the low New Zealander at age 14.]

[Update 3 (2/2/09, 1:43 am: Liz Smith has more on how Nocera stayed calm in the wind while Hull struggled with her putter and Oh lost her composure.]

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