Internationals win Presidents Cup

MELBOURNE, Australia— International captain Peter Thomson carried the most important piece of local knowledge in the Presidents Cup.

A five-time British Open champion, Thomson was quietly confident all week that when the Presidents Cup left American soil for the first time, the 14-inch sterling trophy would not be returning with the U.S. team.

He called the Americans the “greatest collection of golfers in the world” during the opening ceremonies, but he knew his 12 players from seven countries were more than equal to the task.

He knew it before Nick Price clinched the International team’s first Presidents Cup by beating David Duval in only the second singles match on a rainy Sunday.

He even knew it before Frank Nobilo’s 40-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole of the first match of the cup rocked Royal Melbourne Golf Club and set the tone for a week of spectacular and improbable shots that rattled the Americans.

“The momentum started before we ever teed off,” Thomson said. “We were already rolling out of the gate by Friday. What happened was already locked in.

“I did tell you I thought that the U.S. team is a mighty team. Well, we think now we’re just as mighty. We’re thrilled to have succeeded. That’s what we set out and do, and it went beyond our dreams.”

For the Americans, it was another nightmare on a course so unfamiliar to them that the matches might as well have been played on Mars.

Relentless from the start, determined to the end and making so many putts that the holes must have looked like craters, the International team handed the Americans their worse loss ever in match play — a 20 1/2 -11 1/2 victory that cost them yet another cup.

Not since a 16 1/2 -11 1/2 loss to Europe in the 1985 Ryder Cup have the Americans been so embarrassed.

“There’s not going to be any meetings or seminars on trying to figure out what happened,” said Mark Calcavecchia, one of only four Americans to win a singles match on a day when they needed to win 10. “It’s just that they played great. They made a lot of putts. That’s where they were aiming, and they went in.”

Did they ever.

Everywhere captain Jack Nicklaus looked around Royal Melboure, he saw the same frightening results — Craig Parry chipping from 50 feet on the 18th to turn a loss into a victory, Ernie Els making putts from everywhere, Joe Ozaki holing a wedge from the first fairway and Shigeki Maruyama making birdies in flurries to go 5-0 for the week.

For the United States, it all looked familiar. They attributed their loss in the Ryder Cup at Valderrama to Europe making all the important putts.

“Ask the golfing gods. I don’t know,” Woods said when asked why the putts seem to fall for everyone but them. “When a team is making it from 50 feet on the last hole to win matches, holing out on the first hole, chipping in … there’s really nothing you can do about that. Those are the shots that, chances are they’re going to do well to get them close. And they were making them.”

But as Nicklaus pointed out Saturday, when the International team was sitting on a 14 1/2 -5 1/2 lead and needing only two points from the singles matches to win, the U.S. team didn’t have nine major championships and 109 PGA Tour victories under its belt without making some of those putts.

“I think that’s sour grapes,” Nobilo said. “How many chip-ins, and how many iron shots do you want to stop a nine-point victory?”

Some of the Americans said that the Presidents Cup could take a big step in matching the prominence of the Ryder Cup if the International team won, just like the Ryder Cup became a show-stopper once Europe started winning.

None of them, however, expected a massacre in Melbourne.

“The amazing thing is, it wasn’t even close,” Calcavecchia said. “Losing by a point or two you could have said, `Well, just one putt here or one putt there.’ But it was worse than that.”

The United States needed a miracle on Sunday, but not even wet, soft conditions that tamed Royal Melbourne could help.

Thomson sent out Parry, one of his four Australians who knew every nuance about Royal Melbourne, against Justin Leonard in the first match Sunday, and it was over quickly.

Parry made a 20-foot birdie putt at No. 5 after Leonard hit a wedge into 3 feet, went ahead with another 20-footer on the next hole and was on cruise control after Leonard three-putted the seventh. It ended 5 and 3.

“I know the golf course probably better than anybody except Norman,” Parry said.

Duval, one of four Americans to failed to win a match this week, missed birdie chances on four of the first five holes and lost 2 and 1. Price was pure with the putter, and Duval had no choice but to concede a tap-in par that set off the clinching celebration.

The only thing left to be decided was whether Woods could beat Norman in the match that all of Australia seemed to want. He did, hanging on for a 1-up victory that was no consolation.

Associated Press