When Greg Norman is on his game, few stand a chance.
The Australian star played yet another round of exquisite golf Sunday, closing with a 5-under-par 67 to win the Players Championship by four strokes.For the third consecutive round he set a scoring record on the home course of the PGA Tour, the TPC at Sawgrass, a course once cursed by players as unplayably difficult.
But Norman, drawing on his British Open triumph last summer and taking full advantage of what he called soft conditions, turned the TPC at Sawgrass into his personal plaything.
He opened the tournament with a 63 and set course records at 130 for 36 holes and 197 for 54. His final round produced a total of 24-under total of 264, six shots better than the course record set by Nick Price last year.
Norman ranked the runaway, wire-to-wire triumph "very high" among his 66 career victories around the world.
"For the last two days, I drew on Royal St. Georges," he said, referring to the near-perfect final round last summer that provided him with his second British Open title.
"Royal St. Georges was a great advantage for me. At Royal St. Georges, I played with focus and control and dedication. That's the way I played today," he said.
And the timing of the victory couldn't be better.
"It's a very important win for me, playing like I did and going into Augusta" and the Masters week after next, he said.
But even with all the superlatives, he failed to reach the personal goal he had set.
"I've never gone through 72 holes without making a bogey," he said. "That was my goal today."
He failed by the thickness of a butterfly's wing.
His only bogey of the week came in the final round, on the par-3 13th, where he missed the green "with the only really bad swing I made all week."
He chipped to about 8 feet and was standing over that par putt when a butterfly fluttered across his line. He didn't flinch. And he didn't back away. But the putt missed on the left.
It was a bogey. But in the end, it mattered not at all.
He led by four shots going into the final round, increased the margin to six on the first hole and really wasn't threatened in the front-running romp.
"He was very difficult to beat," said Fuzzy Zoeller, the easy-going veteran who now has been a runner-up in his last three starts.
"He played extremely well. He did everything you have to do to win. I got beat by the best in the world."
Zoeller, playing in the final twosome with Norman, outlasted Jeff Maggert in the battle for second place, making birdie on three of the last four holes for a 67 and a 268 - a score good enough to win all 20 previous Players Championships.
And he refused to join the chorus clamoring for changes to make the golf course more difficult.
"They shouldn't make any changes," he said. "They should just pat us on the back and let us come back next year. There's nothing wrong with the course. It was just the conditions and you can't do anything about that," he said.
Although Norman never appeared to be in danger of being overtaken, he could not be totally secure until he got his tee shot safely on the island green of little terror that is the par-3 17th.
"It's the toughest 141 yards under pressure in golf," Norman said.
But when he hit his 9-iron to within 2 feet of the flag, Zoeller gave him a high-5, acknowledging that the game was over.
After both drove off the 18th tee, Zoeller threw his arm around Norman's shoulder, patted him on the back and then, as they neared the green, led the cheers for the man he beat in a playoff for the U.S. Open title 10 years ago.
On the green, after Norman had lipped out a meaningless birdie putt, Zoeller halted him before the tap-in to wipe the perspiration from his face with a towel.
Norman laughed, clapped his planter's hat on Fuzzy's head and dropped the putt to win it.
Maggert once held second alone but four-putted from long range for a bogey-6 on the 16th hole. He finished with a 68 and a 271, the only other man in the field within 12 shots of the winner. Hale Irwin, 69-276, was fourth.
Norman's 12th official victory on the American tour was worth $450,000 from the total purse of $2.5 million and increased his earnings to $566,333, the best on the tour this year, in only four American starts.
Norman also slipped past Paul Azinger into second place on the all-time money-winning list at $7,173,986.
Dinah Shore Tournament
At Rancho Mirage, Calif., the fans in the gallery were yelling at Donna Andrews to go jump in the lake, so she did.
Dinah Shore would have approved.
Andrews sank a 6-foot putt to win the Dinah Shore tournament Sunday, then, after signing her scorecard, leaped into the murky waters alongside the 18th green at Mission Hills Country Club.
Shore, who died of cancer last month, had helped Amy Alcott celebrate her victory in the 1991 tournament by gleefully accompanying Alcott into the lake.
In a dramatic finish to the 1994 Dinah Shore, Andrews beat Laura Davies by one stroke after the two battled for the lead all day.
Andrews bogeyed No. 17 to fall a shot behind Davies. Then Davies, trying to play conservatively and protect her one-shot lead on No. 18, spoiled her chances when she hit her approach shot some 60 feet from the pin. Her putt left her a 10-footer for par, and she missed.
Then Andrews, who had hit her third shot within 6 feet of the pin, made the birdie putt to win her second tournament in two weeks, and her first title in an LPGA major.
"It really feels great," said Andrews, 26, who has steadily improved since she joined the tour in 1990 and appears to be one of the emerging stars of women's golf.
"I was dry when I signed my card and did TV, but then the crowd was yelling for me to go in (the lake). ... Anything to please the crowd."
Andrews' caddy and husband, John Reeves, escaped the dunking because he had wandered off.
"But I gave him a big hug afterward to make sure he got wet, too," Andrews said.
Andrews shot a closing 70 that put her at 12-under-par for the tournament. Davies also had a 70.
The final day provided a duel between two players who already had victories this month. Andrews won at Tucson, Ariz., in mid-March, and Davies won at Phoenix the weekend before the Dinah Shore.
Davies, the longest driver on the women's tour, chose to use a 4-iron off the tee on the final hole, but hit into trees along the right side of the 526-yard, par-5 hole. She hit a 2-iron out, some 150 yards from the green, but then hit her 8-iron poorly, leaving herself in danger of three-putting, which she did.
Andrews, meanwhile, hit her 3-wood off the tee into the middle of the fairway, hit the 3-wood again to within 140 yards of the green, then hit a 6-iron in close birdie range and made the putt to win $105,000.
Davies' bogey probably cost her $40,000, as she got $65,165 for finishing second.
"On the scale of one to 10 in disappointed, I'm a 10 right now," said Davies, whose strategy was to go for par on 18, which meant Andrews would have had to birdie just to tie.
"She played the last hole a little more aggressively than I did. ... I think the way I played 18 was the only way for me to play it," Davies said. "I just have to say, `Donna, well done."'
Andrews began the day at 10-under, one shot in front of Davies.
Davies birdied the second hole to draw even, and there was never more than one shot difference between them the rest of the round.
Andrews went in front with a birdie on No. 5, then slipped back into a tie with a bogey on No. 7. Both players birdied the ninth hole, then Davies went up by a shot with a birdie on No. 11.
Andrews caught her at 12-under with a birdie on the 12th hole, then they matched pars until Andrews bogeyed No. 17.
Tammie Green shot a closing 68 to finish third, two shots behind Davies.
Jan Stephenson, who hasn't won a tournament since 1987, played well in the Dinah Shore and finished fourth with a 71 to go 8-under. Stephenson, 42, has been fighting her way back from a 1990 injury that jeopardized her career - a mugger ripped a ring off her finger during a robbery in Miami, breaking her ring finger in two places.
Michelle McGann, who began the final round two strokes off the lead, shot a 73 to finish fifth.
Nancy Lopez, who shared the opening round lead with a 73, 68, shot a 71 Sunday to wind up 4-under.
Helen Alfredsson of Sweden, the defending Dinah Shore champion, spoiled her chances of repeating with a 76 the first day. She finished at 5-over, including a 74 for the final round.
Andrews, who played college golf at North Carolina, earned $299,839 in 1992, then $334,285 last year, including winning the Ping Cellular One Championship for her first LPGA victory.
This year's tournament at Mission Hills was a tribute to Shore, who had been affiliated with the event since it began in 1972 and had taken a very active role in promoting women's golf. Shore, who was 76, died Feb. 24 at her home in Beverly Hills. The LPGA last week made her an honorary member of its Hall of Fame.
The Dinah Shore tournament is sponsored by Nabisco.