ESPN Golf Online: 1999 U.S. Open: Hole of the day: No. 16

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Hole of the day: No. 16

By Mike Grady
ESPN Golf Online
PINEHURST, N.C. -- While the drama at No. 18 to end the 99th U.S. Open will be what people talk about and remember, it was the theatrics at No. 16 that deserve headline billing.
The 489-yard, par-4 16th provided huge thrills for the leaders as they battled for one of golf's most prized trophies. One by one, the game's greatest players put on a show Sunday for those fans lucky enough to be gathered around the 16th green.
First came Vijay Singh. The defending PGA Championship champion had put together a quiet, solid round while most of the attention was focused on the two groups behind him. Tiger Woods was in the group directly behind Singh, and Payne Stewart and Phil Mickelson were staging a match-play battle right after that.
But Singh was a serious contender when he reached 16. He was sitting at even par, only a stroke behind both Stewart and Mickelson and a stroke ahead of Woods.
A drive into the left rough on the 16th, however, led to an even worse fairway wood shot for Singh. He pulled it low and left, ending up short of the green in the rough again. From there, Singh's wedge to the green ended up well past the hole. The subsequent two-putt bogey dropped him two strokes behind Mickelson, who was in the process of taking the lead thanks to Stewart's bogey on 15.
Woods had a different experience on the 16th. Standing at 1-over and needing something to happen to figure into the finish, Woods hit one of his best low iron shots of the day. It ended up just 12 feet right of the hole, from where he drained it to move to even par.
Woods punctuated the birdie -- just the 11th of the tournament on the hole -- with a fist pump, charging the crowd into a frenzy. But Mickelson and Stewart, standing back on the tee at the time, were about to give the fans even more to shout about.
Both ended up off the putting surface after their approach shots on the hole, which plays normally as a par 5 and ended up rated the second most difficult in the tournament. Stewart's ball was well short and left, and Mickelson's was just off the green but in a tough lie near the right front bunker. Stewart, chipping first, knocked his a good 20 feet beyond the hole.
"For some reason I felt like I had to chip that in," said Stewart. "I shouldn't have thought that way, but I did and ended up hitting it way too hard."
Mickelson did a little better with his chip, but still left himself with a testy 6-footer. And it was a longer six feet after Stewart somehow sank his downhill 25-foot putt.
"I don't know what to say," Stewart said. "I just went through my normal routine, kept my head down, and when I looked up it was dropping into the hole."
Possibly unnerved by Stewart's great par save, Mickelson pulled his putt left for a bogey and a tie at even par.
"The tendency for me this whole week was to pull my putts a little," Mickelson said. "And that's what happened on that one. I read it as a double-breaker, and I just pulled it a little too far right to get all the break back to the left."