Steve Stricker Wins Ally Challenge at Warwick Hills
Already Says He Can’t Wait to Return
By Tom Lang
GRAND BLANC – The 12th hole was trying to destroy the day for several leaders of the Ally Challenge.
The benign, shorter par 4 is one of those holes that golfers call a ‘birdie hole.’ But during Sunday’s final round, several players near the top were having fits with it – even eventual winner Steve Stricker – who bogeyed the hole.
The difference was Stricker birdied the next four consecutive holes to hold on and pull away from a hard-charging Brett Quigley. Stricker earned his 9th PGA Tour Champions win (in 44 starts) with a 5-under closing round and 15-under three-day total, edging out Quigley’s 14-under – four strokes gained of which came with Quigley finishing eagle-birdie-birdie on holes 16-18.
“It feels pretty good, the way I just kind of hung in there today,” Stricker said. “Didn't really start off that great, hit some wayward shots, just kind of managed my game a little bit getting it around. Didn't really feel good about what I was doing with my swing, just felt off.
“But made some good up-and-downs to keep the round going and then made a really silly bogey in the middle of the fairway on No. 12. I had 100 yards, flew it over the green, made a bad bogey. Then I just told Nicki (spouse and caddie), I said ‘we're still in this.’ We just keep our head down and keep plugging. Next thing you know, I rattled off four birdies. That was the whole difference in the tournament right there. You know what, just having a good attitude today. When things like I felt weren't going right, that I just kept plugging along and things turned around and I did some good things coming in.”
Ernie Els lost his ball on No. 12 and ended up with a double bogey, before a bogey on 13 that knocked him too far down the leaderboard. Padraig Harrington was playing in the final group with Stricker and Scott Dunlap. The Irishman, who won the tournament the week prior, didn’t get a bogey all week until the 12th hole. Harrington and Dunlop ended up T4 at 12-under par.
Stricker, who won $300,000 of the $2 million purse, reminisced with media about his days playing in the Buick Open at Warwick Hills.
“It's got a great history here, great champions from past Buick Opens,” he said. “I don't know how many times I was here, but I definitely was here. I'm looking forward to coming back already, but it is, it's a storied history here at Warwick Hills. The community here opens up their doors for us and the club, the Brody family, the sponsors with Ally and McLaren, it's just, it's a special event because it's like old-school PGA Tour golf right here in these smaller communities. We had one in Milwaukee for a lot of years, too, so it has that similar feel. It's great to be the champion here.”
Stricker has never held back the importance of family in his life, part of why his wife was serving as caddie, a job he held recently for his daughter, Bobbi, who made it through the first stage of LPGA Q-School last week with her dad on the bag.
“Yes, I've seen a lot of golf lately,” Stricker said. “Our family's been going through a lot of golf lately. I caddied for Bobbi last week and that was probably cooler than this. I mean, just to be a part of what she did and to see the enjoyment and the excitement on her face knowing that she's going on to the next stage means a lot to a dad. That was pretty cool. Like I said, I think that was cooler than today. We've had some fun the last few weeks and hopefully we can continue that going forward.”
Don’t take it too hard fans – supporting your daughter is okay being better than winning another pro golf tournament. And if things work out that Stricker returns next year to defend, there will be a lot of excitement in Grand Blanc.
