Kim Hyo-joo on Sunday won the season-opening Pure Silk-Bahamas LPGA Classic, relegating Stacy Lewis to yet another second-place finish.
Kim rebounded from a bogey on the 16th hole with a 9-foot birdie putt on the par-three 17th and closed with a par for a two-stroke victory over Lewis, last year’s champion Kim Sei-young and Anna Nordqvist.
“Really happy that I won here, because it’s just like a really good start to the season,” Kim Hyo-joo said through fellow South Korean player Minjee Lee. “Good vibes.”
Kim Hyo-joo shot a seven-under 66 at the breezy Ocean Club to finish at 18-under 274. The 20-year-old player has three LPGA Tour victories, also winning the 2014 Evian Championship and last year’s Founders Cup. She has nine victories on the Korean LPGA.
“She’s just so used to winning,” caddie Dean Herden said. “I mean, she’s won so many times in Korea that she’s very comfortable when she’s on top of the leaderboard, and getting there. Her iron play got better today. Didn’t hit the iron shots very well yesterday, hit a lot of thin shots. Last night we were working on something and today she was able to hit a lot more solid shots.”
Needing an eagle to force a playoff, Lewis parred the par-five 18th for a 68. She has nine runner-up finishes in a 40-event victory drought that dates to June 2014. The 11-time tour winner has 22 career second-place finishes.
“Seven-under is a great score and I knew it was going to take something like that today on this golf course with less wind,” Lewis said. “You know you needed to shoot a number. Just got off to a bit of a slow start. Making bogey on eight really hurt, but proud of the way I came back on the back nine and gave myself a chance.”
Kim Sei-young also shot a 68, and Nordqvist had a 69.
Kim Hyo-joo made three straight birdies — holing putts of 18 feet on the par-three 12th, 15 feet on the par-four 13th and 5 feet on the par-four 14th — to open a three-stroke lead.
After the bogey on the difficult par-four 16th that cut her advantage to one shot, she hit a slight draw with a four-iron to set up the birdie putt on the 171-yard 17th.
“Very tricky one,” Herden said. “Grain was into us. It could have gone left to right or right to left, we weren’t quite sure. She decided inside left edge and straight in.”
Kim Hyo-joo had four birdies on the front nine, making three in a row on hole four through six and adding another on No. 8.
Third-ranked Lewis parred the final three holes after birdieing holes 13 through 15. After missing long birdie tries on 16 and 17, she hit a three-wood into the light rough near the right-side front bunkers on 18, flopped 8 feet past and two-putted for par.
“I was just trying to get the three-wood to skip up the hill and just started it a little too far right,” Lewis said.
Kim Sei-young had a double bogey on the par-four ninth, then rallied with four birdies on the back nine.
“I did my best, but I couldn’t catch [Kim] Hyo-joo,” Kim Sei-young said.
Nordqvist, tied with Charley Hull for the third-round lead, birdied the final two par-fives.
Pornanong Phatlum matched the tournament record with a 65 to tie for fifth with Paula Creamer (66) and 2013 winner Ilhee Lee (68) at 15-under. Brittany Lincicome also shot a 65 to join Hull (71) and Kwak Min-seo (67) at 14 under.
Megan Khang, playing her first event as an LPGA Tour member, bogeyed the final hole for a 60 to drop into a tie for 11th at 13-under.
Kaohsiung-born Candie Kung of the US carded a five-under 68 to finish tied for 17th with three others on a 282 total, while Taiwan’s Hsu Wei-ling finished tied for 43rd with a five-under 287 total.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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