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Taylor emerges on a wild day at Bay Hill
2007-03-18
Conditions were ripe for Vaughn Taylor to lose his temper. A quiet perfectionist with no patience for anything less than perfect, he already had dropped two shots Saturday in the Arnold Palmer Invitational when he saw a leaderboard on the sixth tee that showed him seven shots behind. Instead of getting down on himself, he got sensible. "I've learned from the past few weeks that there was no point in getting too upset today after a couple of bogeys," Taylor said. "I stopped, said to myself, 'Everybody is going to make a couple of bogeys.' I just tried to keep moving on." The next time he saw a leaderboard was behind the 18th green, and it was full of surprises. Taylor played mistake-free the rest of the third round, chipping in for birdie on the ninth hole and saving par on the final hole to shoot 3-under 67 and build a two-shot lead over former British Open champion Ben Curtis. The other surprise? The guys he thought were running away with the tournament -- Rocco Mediate and Paul Casey -- were five shots behind. And so was Tiger Woods. It was a wild day at Bay Hill, when players' fortunes shifted as quickly as the weather went from chilly and blustery to pleasant and only a mild breeze. When it was over, Taylor was at 8-under 202 and staring at a great opportunity to capture a PGA Tour event where all the stars have come out to play. His only two victories were at the Reno-Tahoe Open, held the same week in August as a World Golf Championship at Firestone. The tough part for Taylor is that so many top players are still in the mix at Bay Hill. Three shots behind were Vijay Singh (67) and Tom Lehman (69), the former Ryder Cup captain who benched Taylor the first day of matches and now has to try to chase him down. Fifteen players were within five shots of the lead, a group that includes Woods. As badly as he played Friday, Woods figured he had no business being in contention. As well as he hit the ball Saturday, he figured there was no way he shouldn't have been around the lead. He had to settle for 16 pars and a 70, leaving him five shots back and facing odds of having never won at Arnie's place when he wasn't in the lead. "I gave myself a chance," Woods said. It all starts with Taylor, who knows that a two-shot lead is virtually meaningless at a place like Bay Hill given the guys chasing him, and his own record on Sunday. He is 166th on the PGA Tour in final-round scoring average. "I'm just trying to look at it as I've got my bad Sundays out of the way already," Taylor said. "Just got good ones left." Early in the round, it looked as if it would be a two-man race between Mediate and Casey, who both reached 10 under. But as the weather shifted, they went the opposite direction. Mediate, who had a three-shot lead at the start of the third round, birdied the first and final hole and made a mess of it in between on his way to a 76. Casey made seven bogeys on the back nine and shot 73. Curtis, a two-time winner last year, also dropped shots early before hitting his stride on the back nine. He has six top 10s on the PGA Tour, three of those victories, and feels just as capable as anyone on Sunday. "If you can hit the fairways and hit some greens and give yourself a lot of opportunities to make some birdies, it doesn't matter who you are," Curtis said after a 69. "I'm just happy to be in this position. Any time you can shoot in the 60s three days in a row out here, you'll be happy." Singh, a three-time runner-up at Bay Hill, will be paired with the 48-year-old Lehman, who hasn't won on tour in seven years. The group at 4-under 206 included Trevor Immelman (70), Sergio Garcia (71), former PGA champion Shaun Micheel (71) and Jerry Kelly (70), who needs a victory to have any chance of getting into the World Golf Championship next week at Doral. Among those at 207 with Woods were two-time U.S. Open champion Retief Goosen and Players champion Stephen Ames. Mediate made one of only two birdies at the opening hole to reach 10 under, and it turned into a two-man race when Casey fired off four birdies in a five-hole stretch to reach 10 under. By the end of the day, neither was anywhere near the top of the leaderboard. Casey chopped his way through the rough on the par-5 12th to begin his string of five consecutive bogeys when his swing failed him. Mediate didn't make another birdie after No. 1. A two-shot swing cost him the lead at the par-5 sixth, and a double bogey on the 14th continued his spiral. Singh matched Taylor with the best round of the day at 67 and had no idea how close that would leave him from the lead. "Depending on the leaders," Singh said. "If they don't go crazy on the back nine, I think I have a shot tomorrow." They went crazy, all right. And he does have a shot tomorrow in the tournament where he has been runner-up three times. Then again, just about everyone does. Divots:@ Brett Quigley was tied for 84th when he finished his round Friday at 3 over and, figuring he had no chance to make the cut, drove home to Jupiter. He wound up making it on the number, which was good -- FedEx Cup points and all that. The bad news is he had to get up at 3:30 a.m. to return to Bay Hill for the third round. Quigley shot 72 and was at 5-over 215. ... Masters champion Phil Mickelson shot a 72 and was at 2-over 212. ... Ernie Els was at 3 under and trying to join the fray until a double bogey on the 15th and a bogey on the next hole sent to a 71 that left him at 210.
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