[PHOTO: Raj Mehta]
The LPGA returned to the Boston area for the first time in 25 years since the 1999 Areaweb.com Championship and was received with a lengthy final-day weather delay and a playoff. A two-hour-plus pause with the last group on the 15th green put into question if play would finish on schedule.
Despite the break, Haeran Ryu won with a par on the first extra hole to squeeze in the FM Championship right at sunset. Here’s how Ryu overcame a four-stroke deficit to win in an up-and-down week-long performance, closing with an eight-under 64 for her second career title.
Leaderboard
Win: Hae Ran Ryu (-15)
Second: Jin Young Ko (-15)
Third: Ruixin Liu (-14)
T-4: Allisen Corpuz (-13)
T-4: Jeeno Thitikul (-13)
What it means
Ryu takes home $US570,000, the largest first-place prize of the non-majors or tour championship, and relinquishes the unwanted title of most top 10s in a season on the LPGA without a victory. The win is her ninth top-10 in 2024, second to Amundi Evian Championship winner Ayaka Furue. Ryu redeems two missed opportunities to win earlier this year, holding a pair of one-shot 54-hole leads in the Chevron Championship and CPKC Women’s Open, but struggled in the final round with a 74 and 75, respectively. Ryu, 23, joins KPMG Women’s PGA Championship winner Amy Yang as the two South Korean winners on the LPGA this year.
Ko, meanwhile, snapped a streak of closing seven consecutive 54-hole leads for victories. The 15-time winner is in form with four top-10s in her past six starts but is losing time to extend her LPGA winning streak to eight straight years, with only 10 events left this year.
How it happened
Play was suspended at 3:42pm local time as a storm system moved through Norton, Massachusetts, for slightly longer than two hours with the final group on the 15th green and Ryu tied for the lead with Ko. With three holes remaining after the delay, Ryu and Ko stayed tied and headed to the 18th for the start of extra holes.
Instead of Ryu needing to survive a playoff, she could have won at the start of the weekend. She followed a career-best bogey-free 10-under 62 to build a six-shot lead by combusting with a third-round 78. Ryu called her coach after the round, and it was suggested she play a fade and favour misses to the right. The strategy and a little rain ahead of play on Sunday made TPC Boston much more scoreable for Ryu. She went out in six-under on the front nine, rediscovering her round-two form to trail Ko by a stroke heading into the closing side.
Play resumed at 5:48pm, with Ryu taking the first chance after the restart to break the tie with Ko on the par-5 18th. Ryu parked her pitching wedge from 112 metres to four feet. She missed the putt. Ryu’s two-putt gave her the clubhouse lead with a 64.
Ko made two five-foot par saves on the 15th and 17th, and was six feet from victory on the 18th after hitting her wedge from 89 metres close. The two-time player of the year couldn’t muster one final six-footer, sending the South Korean tandem to a playoff. Ryu laid up on par-5 to 110 metres and hit it to eight feet on a line similar to the last time she was on the 18th green. Ryu wouldn’t have to make it, as Ko went long left from 101 metres to short-side herself, and narrowly missed a 35-footer for par. Ryu lagged close to the cup for an uneventful two-putt to win.
Shot of the day
Arpichaya Yubol holed out for an eagle on the par-4 17th as part of an end-of-round surge. The Thai, who turned her season around with a fifth-place finish in the US Women’s Open, closed with four birdies and the eagle to finish T-6 at 11-under.
https://twitter.com/LPGA/status/1830327300954403159
Aussie watch
Robyn Choi had our attention after a scorching 69-68 start, but she fell away on the weekend to share 25th place. Hannah Green used a closing 67 to edge inside the top 10, finishing as part of a five-way tie for 10th place. Grace Kim (T-52) was the only other Australian to make the cut.
Best of the rest
US Solheim Cup captain Stacy Lewis must be pleased, as the Americans are headed to the Solheim in form. Five American players peppered the top of the leaderboard, with Corpuz (T-4), Jennifer Kupcho (T-6), Lauren Coughlin (T-10), Sarah Schmelzel (T-10), and Lexi Thompson (T-15) finishing in the top 15. Carlota Ciganda (T-10) was the only European team member in the same range. The American team will look to win the cup for the first time since 2017 next week at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Virginia.
Ruixin Liu’s first hole of the championship was a quintuple-bogey, and it took birdieing her last two holes on Friday just to make the two-over-par cutline. The 2018 Epson Player of the Year went on a 64-64 weekend tear, beating her previous career-best round of 65 twice. The charge earned her third place, Liu’s best-ever finish on the LPGA, topping her seventh-place effort at last year’s Blue Bay LPGA.
