By Tom LaMarre
Tiger Woods and Ernie Els provided the most compelling moments in Presidents Cup history after the United States and International teams played to a 17-17 deadlock through regulation play in 2003 at Fancourt Hotel and Country Club in George, South Africa.
Woods and Els went head-to-head in a sudden death playoff to determine the winner of the Cup, but play was halted by darkness after they played three extra holes and a tie was declared.
“I thought I had him beat for once,” Els, who has finished behind Woods more times than he would like to remember, said of the third and final playoff hole. “He had a left-to-right putt, four foot of break it seemed like and in darkness. I had a pretty straight one going up the hill. I really thought maybe this time he was going to miss one.
“But he poured it in.”
Els and Woods will face each other again this week as captains of their respective teams in the 13th Presidents Cup beginning Thursday (Wednesday afternoon in the U.S.) at Royal Melbourne Golf Club royalmelbourne.com.au in Melbourne, Australia.
The Americans have dominated the competition, 10-1-1, but the only International victory was a 20½-11½ rout under Captain Peter Thompson of Australia at Royal Melbourne in 1998.
“That was a wonderful time,” said Els, who played for the Internationals in that victory. “I still remember that very clearly, how the guys played, the team spirit we had that week, how they individually stood tall. Looking back at ’98, we basically didn’t have a bad session.
“We got off to a great start on the first day, which really got the crowd fired up. Day two was huge. Everything seemed to go our way and I remember Craig Parry chipping in on 18 to win a tight match 1-up.
“ … Overall, I think we putted a bit better than they did. That’s often the difference in match play. Inevitably a lot of the matches were close and it just comes down to one key moment, one putt, here or there.”
Woods, who has a 24-15-1 record in the Presidents Cup including 6-2 in singles, will join Hale Irwin of the 1994 U.S. team as the only playing captain since the event began that year.
However, the most important thing for Tiger is improving the Americans’ string of seven consecutive victories, including 19-11 two years ago at Liberty National Golf Club in Jersey City, N.J.
“Whatever we deem as the best possible order for our team, that’s what we’re going to run with,” said Woods, who has indicated that he will pick and chose his spots to play, and concentrate on putting the right players together to have the best chance to win.
“Whatever we deem as the best possible order for our team, that’s what we’re going to run with.”
Both teams have lost top players, with top-ranked Brooks Koepka withdrawing from the U.S. team because of a knee injury and was replaced by Rickie Fowler, while International star Jason Day of Australia dropped out because of a back injury and was replaced by Byeong Hun An of South Korea.
The U.S. is favored with a team that includes Woods, Fowler, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Webb Simpson, Matt Kuchar, Patrick Reed and rookies Patrick Cantlay, Bryson DeChambeau, Gary Woodland, Xander Schauffele and Tony Finau.
All the veterans have winning records in the Presidents Cup except Kuchar, who is 6-8-2.
Els’ International team consists of Adam Scott of Australia, Louis Oosthuizen of South Africa, Marc Leishman of Australia, Hideki Matsuyama of Japan, Adam Hadwin of Canada and rookies An, Abraham Ancer of Mexico, Li Haotong of China, C.T. Pan of Taiwan, Sungjae Im of South Korea, Cameron Smith of Australia and Joaquin Niemann of Chile.
Oosthuizen is the only veteran with a winning record at 7-5-2, but the Internationals believe they can pull off the upset.
“It’d be great to stick it to Tiger and the entire American team,” Scott said.
Added Els: “We’d like to kick their asses … ”
And they know Royal Melbourne is the only place that’s happened.
