Hana Bank Championship Preview, Predictions, Pairings

With Tony Jesselli, Hound Dog, and Ward Clayton already providing their previews for the Hana Bank Championship, and LPGA.com's pre-tournament notes and interviews providing further context, it's pretty easy for me to summarize the week's big questions (and add a few of my own):

• can Na Yeon Choi pull off a 3-peat on her home soil?
• can Ya Ni Tseng continue her domination over the world of women's golf?
• can Suzann Pettersen, Se Ri Pak, Grace Park, or Candie Kung win this event for the 2nd time?
• can So Yeon Ryu beat the top LPGAers once again?
• can the Solheim Cuppers in the field turn the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat into extra motivation this week?
• can the injured Cristie Kerr and Ji-Yai Shin finish this 54-hole tournament, much less be a factor in it?
• can Ryann O'Toole make up any ground in the Rookie of the Year race on Hee Kyung Seo?
• will this be the week a Korean member of the LPGA finally breaks through into the winner's circle in 2011?
• will another KLPGA member join Ryu in qualifying for the LPGA's rookie class of 2012 via a non-member win in an LPGA event and follow in the footsteps of Shi Hyun Ahn, Jee Young Lee, and Jin Joo Hong, who have all done it here?

Here's my best guess when it comes to answering these questions, drawing on the tournament history, the course layout, Hound Dog's Hot 20, and the major mo' I got from finishing 1st in 2 of the 3 Yahoo Sports Fantasy Golf leagues I competed in this year (I had to settle for 3rd in the other!) right on the heels of finally winning the last PakPicker:

1. Creamer
2. Choi Na Yeon
3. Pettersen
4. Pressel
5. Lewis
6. Tseng
7. Ryu
8. Yang, Amy
9. Park Inbee
10. Seo
11. Nordqvist
12. Kim In-Kyung

Alts: Kim Song-Hee; Feng; Stanford

Pretty much all the pairings are interesting for one reason or another, but here are the ones that are most interesting to me.  I'll leave it to you to guess why!

1st tee, 10:40 am: Na Yeon Choi, Ya Ni Tseng, Cristie Kerr
1st tee, 10:18 am: Paula Creamer, Stacy Lewis, In-Kyung Kim
1st tee, 9:56 am: Se Ri Pak, Mi Hyun Kim, Grace Park
1st tee, 10:29 am: Suzann Pettersen, Ji-Yai Shin, Michelle Wie
1st tee, 9:34 am: Inbee Park, Hee Young Park, Juli Inkster
1st tee, 10:07 am: So Yeon Ryu, Angela Stanford, Brittany Lincicome
10th tee, 10:07 am: Anna Nordqvist, Maria Hjorth, Eun-Hee Ji
10th tee, 8:50 am: Song-Hee Kim, Shanshan Feng, Chella Choi
1st tee, 8:39 am: Morgan Pressel, He Yong Choi, Hyun-Hwa Sim
1st tee, 8:50 am: Ha Neul Kim, Candie Kung, Vicky Hurst
10th tee, 9:56 am: Hee Kyung Seo, Hyun-Hee Moon, Wendy Ward
10th tee, 9:01 am: Momoko Ueda, Bo-Mee Lee, Mindy Kim

With the Miyazatos taking the week off and some of my favorite young golfers the 1st through 4th alternates, I'm not as pumped for this week as I could be, but that could just be the combination of lots of grading and unexpectedly good weather forecast for the next few days talking.  I expect that to change once I catch up with the Golf Channel coverage!

Hana Bank Championship Preview

After a short break in the LPGA schedule, the tour resumes this week with the Hana Bank Championship. This a 54-hole event.

Here are some of the details:

Course: Sky 72 Ocean Course
Where: Incheon, South Korea
2 Time Defending Champion: Na-Yeon Choi
2010 Winning Score: 69-68-69=206 (-10)

Final Field: 68 Players
Par: 72
Yardage: 6,364 Yards
Purse: $1.8 Million

The biggest stars missing from this tournament are Ai Miyazato and Mika Miyazato.

Here is the television schedule:
Oct 07 1:00-3:00 PM ET GC
Oct 08 1:00-3:00 PM ET GC
Oct 09 1:00-3:00 PM ET GC

Since there is a 13 hour time difference (east coast time), if you are planning to watch this on TV, I would stay away from the LPGA website or reading blogs, as the results will be already posted.

Tony Jesselli's Player of the Year:


1- Yani Tseng - 289.06 points
2- Stacy Lewis - 185.34
3- Cristie Kerr - 158.50
4- Suzann Pettersen - 147.44
5- Angela Stanford - 129.68
6- I.K. Kim - 122.10
7- Paula Creamer - 116.88
8- Brittany Lincicome - 114.06
9- Mika Miyazato - 114.02
10-Amy Yang - 112.40
11-Karrie Webb - 111.56
12-Morgan Pressel - 106.26
13-Na Yeon Choi - 102.48
14-Ai Miyazato - 96.36
15-Maria Hjorth - 84.02
16-Jiyai Shin - 77.34
17-Michelle Wie - 76.70
18-Inbee Park - 72.72
19-Brittany Lang - 72.34
20-Anna Nordqvist - 70.40

Rolex Rankings Mover of the Week:
Ritsuko Ryu - Moves from #58 to #46.

Free website hit counter

Follow @tonyjesselli


Tweet

Japan Women's Open Sunday: Yukari Baba Bounces Back

Despite finishing in the top 10 on the JLPGA's year-end money list the past 2 seasons, Yukari Baba had been struggling for much of this one.  She had missed the cut in 5 of her previous 19 starts, had twice failed to crack the top 45 when she did make the cut, and had 2 other finishes outside the top 25.  Sure, her other 10 starts had all been within the top 20, but it was a long time since the start of the season when she finished 2nd in her 2nd start and 5th in her 3rd.  Even when she momentarily pulled herself into contention last Sunday, she stumbled down the home stretch and barely got her 6th top 10 of the season, which only moved her to 22nd on the 2011 money list. 

So it wasn't that much of a surprise when the 54-hole leader of the Japan Women's Open started the final round with 4 bogeys in her 1st 6 holes and topped off that run with a double on the 8th to drop from +6 to +12.  After all, she had only gotten the lead on Saturday because of Mika Miyazato's moving-day collapse, and now she was 4 shots behind playing partner Ritsuko Ryu, 3 shots behind money-list leader Sun-Ju Ahn, and 2 shots behind Ai Miyazato.  What was surprising, however, was what happened next.  Baba engineered a 2-shot swing on Ryu on the very next hole, a 374-yard par 4, then pulled within 1 of the lead when Ryu made her 3rd-straight bogey of the day on the 366-yard par-4 10th.  By then, Ahn had bogeyed the 11th and doubled the 13th, just as Miyazato, playing in the group between Ahn and Baba/Ryu, bogeyed the 12th.  At this point, then, Ryu was +10, Baba and Miyazato were +11, and Ahn was +12.  Even after Baba matched Miyazato's bogey on the 12th to fall to +12, things seemed to be going her way when 1st Miyazato and then Ryu made back-to-back bogeys on 14 and 15 and Ahn offset her birdie on the long par-5 15th with a bogey on the 376-yard par-4 16th.  So Ryu, Baba, and Ahn were tied for the lead at +12 and Miyazato was 1 back as they entered the home stretch.  Ahn was the 1st to crack with a bogey on the 413-yard par-4 18th that brought her to +13.  Miyazato bogeyed her last 2 holes in a row to finish at +15.  It all came down to the final pairing, Ryu and Baba, who were tied for the lead at +12 as they teed off on the tough 18th.  When the dust settled, Ryu had bogeyed it and Baba had parred it, giving the 28-year-old her 3rd JLPGA victory and 1st major of her 9-year career.  Yes, Ryu had made 6 bogeys over her last 11 holes, Ahn had bogeyed 2 of her last 3 after fighting back from a double on each side with her 4th birdie in her 1st 15 holes, and Miyazato had bogeyed 5 of her last 7 holes and played her last 12 in +6, but Baba still played her final 10 holes in even par.

1st/+12 Yukari Baba (73-69-74-76)
T2/+13 Sun-Ju Ahn (72-74-74-73), Ritsuko Ryu (74-73-71-75)
T4/+14 Nachiyo Ohtani (75-72-74-73), Ji-Hee Lee (70-74-74-76)
6th/+15 Ai Miyazato (72-73-74-76)
T7/+16 Young Kim (71-71-81-73), Bo-Bae Song (76-73-73-74)
T9/+17 Sakura Yokomine (76-74-76-71), Mi-Jeong Jeon (70-76-76-77)

T11/+18 Rui Kitada (75-74-81-68), Chie Arimura (71-76-77-74), Na-Ri Lee (73-73-78-74)
T14/+19 Onnarin Sattayabanphot (76-70-79-74), Hyun-Ju Shin (77-70-77-75), Ayako Uehara (72-71-81-75), Ji-Woo Lee (75-68-80-76)
T18/+20 Shanshan Feng (75-72-75-78), Akane Iijima (73-71-78-78)
T20/+21 Eun-A Lim (73-73-79-76), Mika Miyazato (70-71-79-81)
T22/+22 Ah-Reum Hwang (73-75-82-72), Eun-Hee Ji (72-79-77-74)
T25/+23 Eun-Bi Jang (76-74-79-74), Soo-Yun Kang (80-72-76-75), Yuki Ichinose (74-71-79-79)
T29/+24 Miki Saiki (82-72-75-75), Na-Ri Kim (71-78-76-79), Yuri Fudoh (73-73-76-82)
T33/+25 Mayu Hattori (73-77-78-77), Shinobu Moromizato (77-75-75-78)
T35/+26 Mamiko Higa [a] (73-73-84-76), Teresa Lu (70-76-80-80)
T37/+27 Tamie Durdin (76-76-78-77), Rikako Morita (74-79-76-78), Miki Uehara (74-72-75-86)
T40/+28 Harukyo Nomura (72-77-80-79)
42nd/+29 Akiko Fukushima (72-79-81-77)
T43/+30 Sakura Kito [a] (76-78-79-77), Bo-Mee Lee (75-77-80-78), Asako Fujimoto (75-74-82-79), Kumiko Kaneda (70-79-81-80), Momoko Ueda (75-74-80-81)
T50/+31 Yuko Mitsuka (79-73-80-79), Rui Yokomine (79-72-81-79), Erika Kikuchi (72-77-81-81)
53rd/+32 Kaori Aoyama (77-76-80-79)
T54/+33 Kaori Ohe (81-73-83-76)
T60/+39 Hinako Yamauchi [a] (75-79-87-78)
WD Saiki Fujita (71-74-78-WD)

Besides Baba, the only other player who's probably satisfied with her finish may well be Ji-Hee Lee, who played her last 7 holes in -1 to snag a share of 4th place and move to 3rd on the JLPGA money list:

1. Sun-Ju Ahn ￥85.64M
2. Sakura Yokomine ￥71.10M
3. Ji-Hee Lee ￥69.06M
4. Chie Arimura ￥66.12M
5. Miki Saiki ￥61.44M
6. Yukari Baba ￥51.55M
7. Ritsuko Ryu ￥50.07M
8. Yuri Fudoh ￥48.67M
9. Shanshan Feng ￥45.79M
10. Mayu Hattori ￥41.44M
11. Kumiko Kaneda ￥35.19M
12. Hiromi Mogi ￥33.45M
13. Ayako Uehara ￥32.72M
14. Rui Kitada ￥32.51M
15. Mi-Jeong Jeon ￥31.42M
16. Bo-Bae Song ￥30.49M
17. Yuko Mitsuka ￥29.37M
18. Junko Omote ￥28.36M
19. Rikako Morita ￥26.20M
20. Na-Ri Kim ￥25.78M
21. Li-Ying Ye ￥24.74M
22. Inbee Park ￥24.33M
23. Ah-Reum Hwang ￥23.51M
24. Asako Fujimoto ￥23.31M
25. Saiki Fujita ￥21.97M
26. Eun-Bi Jang ￥20.82M
27. Akiko Fukushima ￥20.61M
28. Soo-Yun Kang ￥20.01M
29. Ji-Woo Lee ￥19.31M
30. Hyun-Ju Shin ￥18.87M
31. Shiho Oyama ￥18.86M
32. Eun-A Lim ￥18.62M
33. Teresa Lu ￥18.40M
34. Young Kim ￥17.58M
35. Shinobu Moromizato ￥17.30M
36. Bo-Mee Lee ￥17.07M
37. Na-Ri Lee ￥17.04M
38. Esther Lee ￥16.62M
39. Kaori Aoyama ￥16.23M
40. Momoko Ueda ￥15.53M
41. Akane Iijima ￥14.63M
42. Nikki Campbell ￥14.03M
43. So-Hee Kim ￥13.81M
44. Nachiyo Ohtani ￥13.68M
45. Yumiko Yoshida ￥12.99M
46. Maiko Wakabayashi ￥12.11M
47. Miho Koga ￥11.95M
48. Ji-Yai Shin ￥11.91M
49. Megumi Kido ￥11.75M
50. Yuki Ichinose ￥11.33M

With her 1st top 10 of the year on the JLPGA, Ai Miyazato moves up to #60 on the money list, but she's over 3.5 million yen out of 50th and still only has 5 starts on tour this season.  I assume she'll play at least 1 other in addition to the Mizuno Classic, but her name isn't showing up on the next 2 field lists.  With both Momoko Ueda and Ji-Yai Shin listed for the Hana Bank Classic this coming week on the LPGA, they, too, may find themselves fighting to keep their JLPGA cards for 2012 by the time they return to the tour (assuming Shin's back injury permits her to play again this year).

Japan Women's Open Saturday: Mika Miyazato Collapses, Yukari Baba Takes the Lead

It's a war of attrition at the Japan Women's Open this year and the latest victim is Mika Miyazato, who broke her streak of 6-straight JWO rounds with at least a share of the lead when she stumbled to a 7-bogey, 2-double 79 that dropped her from +1 to +10 on the week.  Still, she trails Yukari Baba by only 4 shots--and only Ji-Hee Lee, Ritsuko Ryu, and Ai Miyazato stand between her and the leader.  Mikan can take a little comfort in the fact that she could still defend her title with a Sunday comeback that would do much to make up for the sting of her Sunday collapse 2 years ago that cost her a chance for her 1st professional win.

Here's how all the leaders and notables stand with only 18 more holes of suffering yet to endure:

1st/+6 Yukari Baba (73-69-74)
T2/+8 Ritsuko Ryu (74-73-71), Ji-Hee Lee (70-74-74)
4th/+9 Ai Miyazato (72-73-74)
T5/+10 Sun-Ju Ahn (72-74-74), Mika Miyazato (70-71-79)
T7/+11 Nachiyo Ohtani (75-72-74), Miki Uehara (74-72-75)
T9/+12 Bo-Bae Song (76-73-73), Shanshan Feng (75-72-75), Yuri Fudoh (73-73-76), Mi-Jeong Jeon (70-76-76), Akane Iijima (73-71-78)


T14/+13 Saiki Fujita (71-74-78), Ji-Woo Lee (75-68-80), Young Kim (71-71-81)
T17/+14 Hyun-Ju Shin (77-70-77), Chie Arimura (71-76-77), Na-Ri Lee (73-73-78), Yuki Ichinose (74-71-79), Ayako Uehara (72-71-81)
T23/+15 Na-Ri Kim (71-78-76), Onnarin Sattayabanphot (76-70-79), Eun-A Lim (73-73-79)
T26/+16 Sakura Yokomine (76-74-76), Teresa Lu (70-76-80)
T28/+17 Shinobu Moromizato (77-75-75)
T30/+18 Soo-Yun Kang (80-72-76), Eun-Hee Ji (72-79-77), Mayu Hattori (73-77-78)
T34/+19 Miki Saiki (82-72-75), Rikako Morita (74-79-76), Eun-Bi Jang (76-74-79), Momoko Ueda (75-74-80), Harukyo Nomura (72-77-80)
T40/+20 Tamie Durdin (76-76-78), Rui Kitada (75-74-81), Erika Kikuchi (72-77-81), Kumiko Kaneda (70-79-81), Ah-Reum Hwang (73-75-82), Mamiko Higa [a] (73-73-84)
T46/+21 Asako Fujimoto (75-74-82)
T48/+22 Yuko Mitsuka (79-73-80), Bo-Mee Lee (75-77-80), Rui Yokomine (79-72-81), Akiko Fukushima (72-79-81)
T55/+23 Sakura Kito [a] (76-78-79), Kaori Aoyama (77-76-80)
T60/+27 Kaori Ohe (81-73-83)
62nd/+31 Hinako Yamauchi [a] (75-79-87)

Me, I'm not sure which Miyazato I'd rather see win tomorrow....  I just hope that whatever's causing scoring to have been so high the 1st 3 rounds gives everyone a break in the final one!

LPGA Q-School Stage 2, Round 4: Ginger Howard Medals, Carlota Ciganda Misses Cut

17-year-old Ginger Howard outduelled 25-year-old Julia Boland yesterday to take medallist honors at the 2nd stage of LPGA Q-School.  A bogey-free 65 brought the young Floridian to -16 and a 1-shot margin of victory over the Australian amateur.  Although Howard has 5 SunCoast Series win already this summer, this is no doubt the biggest win of her professional career.  At the other end of the leaderboard, the biggest disappointment of the week has to belong to Carlota Ciganda, who missed the cut by a stroke and will have to wait until January 2012 to attempt to get LET membership.  For those who made the top 70 and ties, including 2-time U.S. Women's Amateur champion Danielle Kang and U.S. WAPL champion Brianna Do (who just squeaked in on the number), they'll have to wait until the end of November for the 3rd and final stage of LPGA Q-School.

Here are the final results for the leaders and notables:

1st/-16 Ginger Howard (69B-70P-68P-65B)
2nd/-15 Julia Boland (73B-67P-67P-66B)
3rd/-8 Stephanie Na (70P-66B-72P-72B)
T4/-7 Nicole Vandermade (74P-72B-69P-66B), Jacqui Concolino (69P-74B-70P-68B), Lizette Salas (69P-69B-72P-71B), Thidapa Suwannapura (70B-71P-66P-74B)
T8/-5 Mitsuki Katahira (70B-74P-71P-68B), Lili Alvarez (70B-71P-72P-70B), Camilla Lennarth (72B-70P-69P-72B), Stephanie Connelly (69B-73P-68P-73B), Hannah Yun (68P-71B-71P-73B)

T13/-4 Shayna Miyajima (70B-71P-71P-72B)
T15/-3 Karlin Beck (70B-71P-73P-71B), Victoria Tanco (71B-71P-71P-72B), Kristin Walla (74P-69B-69P-73B)
T18/-2 Stephanie Kono (73B-71P-71P-71B), Juliana Murcia Ortiz (73B-70P-72P-71B), Laura Kueny (71B-70P-73P-72B), Rebecca Lee-Bentham (70B-70P-74P-72B), Alejandra Llaneza (68P-75B-69P-74B)
T25/-1 Patcharajutar Kongkraphan (69B-71P-75P-72B), Callie Nielson (69B-72P-72P-74B), Junthima Gulyanamitta (69B-68P-71P-79B)
T33/E Cydney Clanton (75P-71B-71P-71B), Maude-Aimee LeBlanc (69P-75B-70P-74B)
T38/+1 Sandra Changkija (73P-75B-74P-69B), Izzy Beisiegel (73P-73B-71P-72B), Natalie Sheary (69P-76B-71P-73B)
T42/+2 Laura Bavaird (73P-72B-70P-75B), Susan Nam (73B-75P-65P-77B)
T47/+3 Briana Vega (73B-73P-72P-73B)
T55/+4 Kristie Smith (70B-73P-75P-74B)
T65/+5 Joanna Coe (72B-77P-71B-73B), Brianna Do (75B-72P-73P-73B), Danielle Kang (73P-74B-71P-75B)

MC: Carlota Ciganda (74B-72P-77P-71B), Kendall Dye (72B-76P-74P-72B), Anya Sarai Alvarez (73P-74B-72P-75B), Blair O'Neal (71B-71P-75P-77B), Esther Choe (74B-75P-73B-73P),  Jenny Lee (71B-77P-74P-74B), Megan McChrystal (71B-74P-76P-75B), Joy Trotter (77B-74P-74B-72P), Katie Kempter (74B-74P-75P-74B), Jessica Yadloczky (76B-76P-72B-74P), Seema Sadekar (75B-75P-73B-76P), Lauren Doughtie (77P-71B-76P-76B), Maiya Tanaka (76P-75B-74B-77P), Eileen Vargas (74P-72B-75P-81B),  Elena Robles (74P-74B-75P-80B), Maria Laura Elvira (72P-77B-80B-75P), Bo Bea Park (78B-81P-77B-77P), Ki-Shui Liao (83P-71B-80B-79P)