CA Championship: Final-round notebook

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DORAL, Fla. -- With Phil Mickelson's victory on Sunday, the 54-hole leader has gone on to win this event eight of 10 times. Along with Mickelson, those winners are Tiger Woods (2007, 2006, 2003, 2002, 1999), Ernie Els (2004) and Geoff Ogilvy (2008).

This marks the first time in CA Championship history that the top three finishers (Mickelson, Nick Watney and Jim Furyk) are all from the United States.

Announced approximate attendance for the week was 110,000.

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Charley Hoffman played the first hole on the Blue Monster birdie, birdie, eagle, birdie this week.

Inside the Numbers

Final Leaderboard

Player Score 1. Phil Mickelson 269 -19 2. Nick Watney 270 -18 3. Jim Furyk 272 -16 4. Jeev M. Singh 274 -14 T5. Oliver Wilson 275 -13 T5. Camilo Villegas 275 -13 T7. Thomas Aiken 276 -12 T7. Soren Kjeldsen 276 -12 T9. Tiger Woods 277 -11 T9. Rod Pampling 277 -11 T9. Kenny Perry 277 -11 T9. Justin Leonard 277 -11

With his 36th career victory, Mickelson moves into a tie with Lloyd Mangrum for 12th on the career wins list.

Mickelson's victory this week is his second win on TOUR this year. Mickelson also won in February at the Northern Trust Open. He has now won two tournaments in each year for the past six years, giving him the longest active streak and the longest such streak of any current player. Woods' longest streak is five years from 1999 to 2003.

Mickelson finished with 99 putts on the week, matching his best putting performance ever (He had 99 putts at the 1998 MCI Classic). The PGA TOUR record for fewest putts through four rounds is 92 by David Frost at the 2005 MCI Heritage at Harbour Town Golf Links. Watney finished with 100 putts on the week.

Mickelson won the 2009 Northern Trust Open on Feb. 22. His victory this week is his second win in three starts, his best stretch since winning the 2006 BellSouth Classic and Masters Tournament in back-to-back weeks. Mickelson won the 2005 FBR Open and AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am in back-to-back weeks; and he won the Nortel Open and Phoenix Open in back-to-back starts, with a week off in between.

Mickelson moves into second place in the standings with 1153 points. After earning just 35 points in his first three starts, Mickelson has ranked up 1108 points with two victories and a top-10 in his last three starts.

Mickelson's victory is the ninth win by a player from the United States in 12 tournaments so far this year. The third-round leader has won 10 of 11 stroke-play events on the PGA TOUR this season.

In six events this year, Watney has not missed a cut and has five top-25 finishes. The winner of the Buick Invitational earlier this season, Watney's second-place check of $820,000 gives him $1,991,570 for the season, surpassing his career-best season mark of $1.8 million from 2007. Watney has made 11 consecutive cuts dating back to last year's Deutsche Bank Championship.

With his second-place finish, Watney moves into the top 10 to ninth in the United States Presidents Cup standings. He also earns 315 points and moves to third in the FedExCup standings behind Geoff Ogilvy and Mickelson.

Thomas Aiken shot the round of a day with a 7-under-par 65 to move from a tie for 30th to a tie for seventh. Aiken was playing in his first-ever World Golf Championships event after qualifying for the field via a third-place finish on the Sunshine Tour's Order of Merit. Aiken's two other appearances on the PGA TOUR came at the British Open (tie for 39th in 2008, missed cut in 2006).

Five players have top 10s in both World Golf Championships events this season. Justin Leonard tied for fifth at the Accenture Match Play Championship and tied for ninth at Doral, while Camilo Villegas tied for ninth at the Accenture and tied for fifth at Doral. Jim Furyk tied for ninth at the Accenture and finished third this week, while Oliver Wilson tied for ninth at the Accenture and tied for fifth here. Mickelson, of course, won at Doral after tying for ninth at the Accenture.

Mickelson now has three consecutive top-10 finishes in World Golf Championships events dating back to his tie for fourth at last year's Bridgestone Invitational. This is Mickelson's first-ever top-10 finish at the CA Championship.

Woods finished the CA Championship with a final-round 4-under 68, matching his score from Saturday. The weekend push moved Woods into the top 10 at tied for ninth. His previous worst finish at the CA Championship was a solo ninth-place finish at the 2004 event at Mount Juliet. Woods now has 25 top-10 finishes at World Golf Championships events and has finished in the top 10 in each of the 10 times he has played the CA Championship.

Michael Bradley, who won the Puerto Rico Open presented by Banco Popular Sunday, also won the 1998 Doral-Ryder Open.

Furyk carded a 67 (-5) on Sunday to finish the tournament with four rounds in the 60s (68-68-69-67) and alone in third. Furyk's best finish of the 2008 season came here at the CA Championship when he shot 68 on Sunday and finished tied for second behind Ogilvy.

Since 2000, no player has won a World Golf Championships event in his first start at that event.

The par-4 16th hole on the Blue Monster measures to approximately 372 yards, depending on the location of the tees. However, several players choose to cut the corner of the dogleg left in an attempt to drive a green that is slightly more than 300 yards away from the tee box. In 2008, 53 players attempted to drive the green out of 313 opportunities. None of the 53 players ended up landing their drive on the green. Soren Hansen's drive in the fourth round was the only drive to reach the green in 2009. Hansen went on to birdie the hole. That was the only one of the 85 attempts on the week to reach the green.

The par-4 18th hole again was the most difficult on Sunday, playing to 4.456 average. For the tournament, the 18th hole played to 4.479 and allowed just 11 birdies, making it the hardest hole so far of the PGA TOUR season. The previous hardest hole of 2009 on the PGA TOUR was the 462-yard, par-4 seventh hole at the South Course at Torrey Pines with an average of 4.402.