Geoff Ogilvy is seeking to win his second World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play title.
Feb. 28, 2009
By PGATOUR.COM Staff
ACCENTURE MATCH PLAY FINAL FOUR: Casey | Cink | Fisher | Ogilvy
Several weeks ago, Geoff Ogilvy and his friend Paul Casey decided to make the one-hour, 45-minute commute from their Scottsdale homes to play the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club. Two of Ogilvy's four wins have come in Tucson so he's well-versed in desert golf but both have come at different venues.
Ogilvy won the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship at the Gallery Golf Club at Dove Mountain, which is located about two miles away. He also finished second there in his title defense.
Ogilvy feels like the extra practice round might have given him -- and Casey, too, since he also reached the quarterfinals -- an edge. He says the Jack Nicklaus design with the vexing greens is a "big local knowledge kind of golf course."
OGILVY QUOTE: "We both play the golf course this many times you got a pretty good handle on how you're playing the golf course. I know (Paul's) game well enough, he hits the ball a long way, he obviously is playing very well this week, so I don't think that the type of game the other guy has affects you, what you do too much. I don't think. Not at this point. We're going to play relatively similar. He's a lot longer than me, but obviously I'll just play the course how I see it."
KEY STAT: Geoff Ogilvy is currently third in career money earned at the Accenture Match Play Championship with $2,140,000. Now that Ogilvy has advanced to the Championship Final he is guaranteed to earn a minimum of $850,000, and pass David Toms, moving into second-place on the list.
FINALS OPPONENT: Paul Casey (Sunday tee time 9:20 a.m. ET)
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| How Ogilvy Reached the Finals |
| Round 1: Defeated Kevin Sutherland |
19 holes |
| Ogilvy twice led 2 up only to see Sutherland come back and square the match in this battle between two former Accenture Match Play champions. His back against the wall for the second time, Sutherland forced the extra holes when he won the 17th with a par and the 18th with a birdie. But Ogilvy, who finished second in his title defense in 2006, came through when it counted with a clutch par to win the match on the 19th hole. |
| Round 2: Defeated Shingo Katayama |
19 holes |
| Ogilvy narrowly avoided the upset as Katayama struggled to close him out. The Japanese pro was 2 up with three holes remaining but had to concede the 16th, 18th and 19th holes to Ogilvy after several adventures in the desert. "It was a bit of a substandard ball striking day for me," Ogilvy said. "I got lucky most times. I had one unplayable, but I had some sort of shot most times." The win may not have been pretty but it boosted Ogilvy's record to 13-2. |
| Round 3: Defeated Camilo Villegas |
2 and 1 |
| Villegas had rolled through his first two matches, beating Rod Pampling in 12 holes in the first round and Miguel Angel Jimenez in 14 holes in the second round. But against Ogilvy, who went to 19 holes in each of his first two wins, Villegas encountered a much tougher opponent, and the Aussie took command after a Villegas bogey at the third hole squared the match. From there, Ogilvy won the next hole with a birdie, went 2 up with a par at the sixth, then went 3 up with a birdie at the eighth. But when Ogilvy carded his first bogey of the day at the 14th and Villegas birdied the 15th, the match suddenly tightened. But Villegas couldn't ride the momentum, bogeying the 16th and 17th as Ogilvy closed out the match. "I play quite well," Ogilvy said. "Felt quite in control of it all. ... A bit loose on 14 and 15 there, but all in all, really happy because he's obviously playing well at the moment." |
| Round 4: Defeated Rory McIlroy |
2 and 1 |
| The 19-year-old Rory McIlroy grew up playing match play as an amateur in Northern Ireland. More recently, though, Geoff Ogilvy has practically perfected the art at the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship -- and Saturday was no exception. Ogilvy, the 2006 champ and '07 runner-up, made eight birdies in the quarterfinals, including a 13-footer on the last hole to assure the victory, while the young Irishman was looking at a 9-footer of his own. McIlroy didn't go down easy, though. The match was all square at the turn after Ogilvy made his only bogey of the day at No. 9. The Aussie rebounded with back-to-back birdies at Nos. 11 and 12 to go 2 up, but McIlroy answered with a birdie on the 13th hole to narrow the deficit. A furious finish saw Ogilvy birdie the final three holes to put the gritty McIroy away. "I couldn't have done much more," McIlroy said. "He threw quite a few birdies at me. ... I think he'll be very tough to beat." Ogilvy returned the compliment. "He's a great player," said Ogilvy, who improved his Accenture Match Play Championship record to 15-2. "I had to play really well. It's the best I've played all week. I birdied the last three holes and only won one of them. He's going to be a top-10 player in the world for as long as he wants." Ogilvy, who planned to spend the break eating lunch with his wife and two young children, said he was glad he brought his best game for a day when he faced two matches. |
| Round 5: Defeated Stewart Cink |
4 and 2 |
| Geoff Ogilvy reached the 36-hole championship match for the third time in the last four years when he knocked off Stewart Cink, who was bidding to make the finals for the second year in a row. Ogilvy never trailed, but Cink threatened to seize the momentum midway through the match when the Aussie had an adventure in a fairway bunker at the 11th hole and his eventual concession squared the match. Ogilvy was clearly frustrated, but promptly shook it off and won four holes in a row to eliminate Cink. The first came at the par-5 13th hole while the Aussie sank a 5-foot birdie putt after Cink missed his from 10 feet. "That was a pretty significant body blow by leaving that putt short," Cink said. "Geoff just cinched the momentum and made birdie after birdie. ...It would have taken a special effort to have beaten him today." Indeed. Ogilvy made a 13-footer for another birdie at the 14th hole and then went dormie with a brilliant 3-wood at the 343-yard, par-4 15th hole that rolled within 6 feet of the pin for an eagle. Cink also drove the green, but his ball didn't quite get up the plateau and stopped 23 feet away. When he missed and Ogilvy made, the Aussie led 3 up with three holes remaining. He polished the match off with a win at the par-3 16th where Cink missed the green and conceded Ogilvy's 12-foot birdie putt when he didn't hole his chip for birdie. Ogilvy was pleased to have brought his best game on the grueling day when he had to beat Northern Irish prodigy Rory McIlroy as well as Cink, who has a 17-10 record at the Accenture Match Play Championship. "So two pretty satisfying guys to beat," Ogilvy said. "And I guess the most satisfying part was I played my best golf in the last few holes of each match, which is really nice." |
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| Previous Accenture Match Play results |
| 2006 |
6 |
0 |
Won |
| Matches: Beat Campell, 19 holes; O'Hern, 21 holes; Weir, 21 holes; D. Howell, 19 holes; Lehman, 4 and 3; Love III, 4 and 3 in final |
| 2007 |
5 |
1 |
2nd |
| Matches: Beat Stricker, 4 and 3; Olazabal, 2 and 1; Fasth, 2 and 1; Casey, 5 and 4; Campbell, 3 and 2. Lost to Stenson, 2 and 1 in final |
| 2008 |
0 |
1 |
T33 |
| Matches: Lost to Leonard, 2 and 1 |
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