LPGA Tournament at Buena Park : Lopez Wins by 2 Shots, or Close to a Mile

The scoreboard indicated Nancy Lopez won the Nippon Travel-MBS golf tournament Sunday by two strokes, but the margin of victory really was closer to a mile.

Lopez fired a two-under par 70 to finish 11-under par, two shots ahead Pamela Wright and Alice Ritzman on the 6,350-yard, par-72 course at Los Coyotes Country Club in Buena Park.

Over the last two days, Lopez was eight under par on a critical stretch of holes beginning at No. 9 and ending at No. 12.

That stretch of ground is actually 185 yards shy of a mile, a 1,575-yard patch of opportunity.

No contender came close to matching Lopez’s performance on those holes for the final two days.

Wright, the third-round leader, was one under par on that cluster of holes during the last two rounds combined. Rosie Jones, who started the day one shot out of the lead, played them in three under. Beth Daniel, who tied for fourth, was also three under. Cindy Rarick, a contender until the back nine Sunday was two under, and Coleen Walker played the four holes in one under.

Lopez began the day nine under par, one shot back of Wright.

Lopez, who is already in the LPGA Hall of Fame, said she was aware of the necessity of scoring well between the ninth and 12th holes.

“Ray (Knight, Lopez’s husband and a former major league baseball player) and I had talked about it,” she said. “I knew I would have a good chance to get some birdies there.”

Lopez started slow with an opening-round 73. Then she put together rounds of 69 and 65.

“I started hitting the ball real well on Friday, but I missed five putts under five feet,” Lopez said.

Knight said: “It was just a matter of time before the putts would start falling.”

Lopez began the final round with bogeys on the first two holes. She got birdies at the fourth and ninth holes to get back to nine under at the turn. At that point, Ritzman had moved to 10 under with a birdie at No. 12.

On the 10th, Lopez mis-hit a sand wedge on her approach shot, which landed 30 yards past the green. But she used the same club to chip the ball into the hole on her next shot. The marvelous shot from a downhill lie in the rough gave her birdie at the 10th and it also provided her first lead of the day, as Ritzman was making bogey at No. 13.

Lopez moved to 11 under with another birdie at No. 12. She took a three-stroke lead after a birdie at 17, but gave a stroke back with a bogey at 18.

This was Lopez’s 42nd victory in her 13-year career. She earned $45,000, which boosts her earnings to $474,103 for the year. Her career earnings total $2,712,158, second behind Pat Bradley, who has earned $2,821,217.

“It was particularly satisfying to win because I haven’t really been feeling very good,” Lopez said.

Last week in Seattle, Lopez was having trouble with getting proper dosages of medication for a hyperthyroid condition. She couldn’t get the condition balanced and she tied for 38th.

Ritzman, who began the day at four under par, got it to 10 under with birdies on the fourth and eighth holes, an eagle at No. 9 and birdies at 10 and 12. But at No. 13, a 359-yard par 4, Ritzman made her first bogey of the day.

Wright, with bogeys at the second and fourth holes, fell to eight under going into the back nine.

The third-round leader made a birdie at the 11th hole to go nine under par, but couldn’t get any closer.

Her best chance to put some heat on Lopez came at the 16th hole. After hitting a long drive into the middle of the fairway, she had a short nine-iron shot, but she left it some 30 feet to the left of the hole and took two putts to ger her par.