Garcia collapse paves way for Vijay victory

Sergio Garcia matched the biggest final-round collapse in PGA Tour history as Vijay Singh won the Wachovia Championship.

Singh capped off a day of high drama at Quail Hollow when he parred the fourth extra hole to win a three-way play-off against Garcia and Jim Furyk after they earlier had finished regulation locked at 12-under-par 276, four shots ahead of Chris DiMarco.

Garcia started the final round with a six-shot lead, but shot just a meek even-par 72, while Singh and Garcia stormed home in 66.

Singh padded his lead at the top of the PGA Tour money list as he completed for his 27th PGA Tour victory and third this year.

“It is harder to play with a big lead,” Singh said. “If you are five or six up, you don’t want to lose the tournament, instead of trying to win it. That played a little bit in his mind. I am thinking he was a little nervous out there. Anybody would be.

"If Sergio had played like he did on Saturday he would have blown us away (but) I thought 12-under was going to be the number starting off, and I was right.

“He didn’t play badly, or shoot a high number. We actually caught him. He is going to feel (ticked) off for sure, but not as bad as Greg did losing the Masters (blowing a six-shot lead in 1996).”

The tournament was Garcia’s to lose, and he offered no excuses after joining Norman, Bobby Cruickshank (1928 Florida Open), Gay Brewer (1969 Danny Thomas Classic) and Hal Sutton (1983 Anheuser-Busch Classic) as the only players to lose after taking a six-shot lead into the final round on the PGA Tour.

“Coming down the stretch, it is not easy to hit perfect shots and unfortunately I hit a couple that cost me,” he said.

“They say you learn more from your losses than your wins, so I can take a lot of positive things out of this week. It is disappointing at the end, but other than that I played well all week.”

Furyk, who drained a seven-foot birdie at the 72nd hole to join the play-off, observed that Garcia could have waltzed to victory if he had putted better early in the round.

“He missed a tap-in (at the first hole),” Furyk said. “He hit a lot of good putts that did not go in and I am sure he lost some concentration. Had he ran the tables and knocked in three or four putts early, it might have been a different story.”

Garcia’s lead was gone in nine holes, after he pulled his tee shot into the trees to double-bogey the par-four ninth. Singh reeled off four birdies in a row from the turn to vault two shots clear, and it was back-and-forth after that.

Singh bogeyed the par-five 15th after a poor chip from behind the green, while Garcia birdied the 14th and 15th to go back in front, only to pull a seven-iron into the drink to bogey the 17th and fall back into a tie.

And so it went to a play-off, with Garcia bowing out at the first extra hole, where he three-putted, missing a six-footer to the left.

“I just did not commit as much as I should have,” he said.

Singh and Furyk traded pars at numbers 16 and 17 before they returned to the par-four 18th, where Furyk was the first to crack, finding the creek left of the fairway with his drive.

He took a penalty stroke and dropped into thick rough, before hacking his third shot back to the fairway. Singh, meanwhile, had fanned a six-iron into a greenside bunker and Furyk figured that if he got up-and-down for bogey, he still had a chance.

His fourth shot was a beauty, too good in fact, hitting the pin and clattering all the way off the green.

Singh then stiffed his bunker shot, tapped in for par, and it was all over. “It was pretty exciting at the end,” said the 42-year-old from Fiji.

“I am playing better golf than last year. It’s just I won more times (nine) last year. When I come to a tournament, I feel I should win. It doesn’t normally happen, but that’s my mindset.”