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Woody Austin comes back to steal spotlight at St. Jude

Woody Austin waves to the crowd after sinking his putt on the 18th green during the final round of the Stanford St. Jude Championship golf tournament on Sunday in Memphis, Tennessee. Austin won the tournament by five strokes. PHOTO: AP

Forget Adam Scott, Vijay Singh or Sergio Garcia tuning up for the US Open with a victory.

Woody Austin ran away with the warmup act.

Trailing by four strokes at the start of play on Sunday, Austin shot the best closing round on tour this year in winning the Stanford St Jude Championship by five strokes for his first PGA Tour victory since 2004 and third overall.

His 8-under 62 was the best final round of Austin's career and the best in the 50 years of this event.

"That was a true round of golf and was one of those surprises that we all get every once in a while," Austin said as he waited for the final group to finish. "I'm just happy it happened to me on a Sunday when it really mattered."

John Daly shot a 79 and finished 79th in the 80-player field. Playing on a sponsor's exemption and tied for eighth after the first 18, he shocked everyone on Friday by accusing his wife, Sherrie, of waking him up by attacking him with a steak knife.

Austin had never finished better than a tie for 44th in his previous trips to the TPC Southwind course, and he has struggled this year missing five cuts with his only top-25 coming with a tie for 18th in New Orleans in April.

"I played one of those dream rounds of golf," Austin said.

But he took home the US$1.08 million winner's check, his first since the 2004 Buick Championship, with the best round this week.

Austin carded an eagle and six birdies in a bogey-free round for a 13-under 267 total on a course where he had missed five cuts. Austin also won the 1995 Buick Open.

This tournament featured its strongest field in years with six of the top 12 players in the world.

They all came wanting to prepare for the Open under tournament pressure.

But Garcia finished before the leaders teed off, Singh wasn't far behind, and Scott -- the world's fourth-ranked player -- blew a three-stroke lead and missed the chance to be the first wire-to-wire winner on tour this year.

Scott shot a 75 and finished seventh at 276.

"I'm going to be hard on myself. I really should be," said Scott, who would have moved up a notch to No. 3 with a victory.

Brian Davis (66) was second with a 272 total followed by two-time Memphis winner David Toms (69-273), Brian Gay (70-274) and Brandt Snedeker and Dean Wilson who tied with 68s for 275.

Austin, playing in the group ahead, birdied the par-4 No. 2 and then holed out from 58m out on the par-5, 507m No. 3 and pulled within a stroke of Scott. He took the lead to himself at 9 under by rolling in a birdie putt from nearly 9m out on the par-4 No. 10.

Scott had a great chance to swing the momentum back his way when he got relief from a sprinkler head in the rough at back of the par-3, No. 11 island green. He stroked in a 10m putt for his first birdie and tied Austin at 9 under.
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