Unbelievable.
That is the only word that could possibly describe what Kyle Stanley was able to do on Sunday at the 2012 Waste Management Phoenix Open.
Spencer Levin started the day at -17 overall, six shots ahead of his closest competitor Webb Simpson and eight shots ahead of Kyle Stanley. Levin had been playing great all week, hitting over 80% of greens in regulation and making putts left and right, and I thought for sure he would win it running away. What is the chance of a player blowing at least a five shot lead in consecutive events?
Levin got off to a good start by going one under through his first three holes, but after that everything seemed to change. After he bogeyed holes four and six to go to one over for his round everyone else started to creep up, including Stanley, Simpson, and Ben Crane.
The key hole came at the 15th, a par five with water right and short of the hole. Stanley made par on the hole after a tee shot to the right forced him to lay-up, and it seemed as though Levin would do the same. He caught a bad break with his tee shot going to the right and landing right behind a bush, and chipped out to leave a mid-length third shot into the par 5. After that though, the unthinkable happened.
Levin chunked his mid iron shot and it landed in the water. You could only imagine the look on his face as water splashed up in the air about 5 yards short of reaching land. It was hard to watch really as he knew it was all but over, making a double bogey on the par 5 and putting him in third place overall for the event after it was all said and done.
Ben Crane had a great chance to catch up to Stanley but the par 3 16th hole was the deciding factor. Both he and Stanley hit their tee shots well over the green and to the left, and Stanley was able to make par while Crane made bogey. All Stanley had to do from then on was to par the last two holes to win and he did for a six under 65, capturing his first PGA Tour title only a week after the heartbreaking loss at Torrey Pines.
Ryan Kekoufski is a scratch golfer who has both played and watched the sport for over a decade. He covers sports for the Yahoo! Contributor Network, and currently resides in Virginia. Follow him on Twitter @RyanKekoufski.
