Crowne Plaza Invitational: Final-Round Notebook  PGA TOUR Staff FORT WORTH, Texas -- The third round of the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial resumed at 8:02 a.m. Sunday and was completed at 11:15 a.m. Round four began at 11:45 a.m. with threesomes off both the first and 10th tees.  Bernhard Langer recorded his best finish since 2001. (Stan Badz/PGA TOUR/WireImage)
• Sunday's playoff between Jim Furyk, Bernhard Langer and Rory Sabbatini was the first three-man playoff in tournament history, and the ninth playoff overall in tournament history. • The playoff was only the second playoff on the 2007 PGA TOUR that involved more than two players. At The Honda Classic, Mark Wilson defeated Jose Coceres, Boo Weekley and Camilo Villegas. • Sunday's playoff was the first three-man playoff on the PGA TOUR since the 2006 Buick Invitational, when Tiger Woods def. Jose Maria Olazabal and Nathan Green. • The top five players on the FedExCup Points list did not change this week. The top five are: Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh, Zach Johnson and Charles Howell III. • This is the fifth time in his PGA TOUR career that Rory Sabbatini has held/shared the 54-hole lead. Previously, he went on to win the 2003 FBR Capital Open and the 2006 Nissan Open, and finished second at the 2001 Mercedes Championship and tied for third at the 2007 Wachovia Championship. • Rory Sabbatini is now 1-1 in his PGA TOUR career in playoffs. Bernhard Langer is 1-2, while Jim Furyk falls to 2-7. • Bernhard Langer's score of 266 is his lowest score ever on the PGA TOUR, but not the lowest in relation to par. Langer's previous low was 268 at the 2001 FedEx St. Jude Classic, where he finished second. • Bernhard Langer's T2 finish was his best on the PGA TOUR since he finished second at the 2001 FedEx St. Jude Classic. • Pat Perez (66-268) was at 12 under par and finished fourth, his best finish on TOUR since he tied for third at THE PLAYERS Championship in 2006. • Rory Sabbatini (first round) became the first tournament winner to post an even-par score of 70 since Phil Mickelson (third round) in 2000. The last tournament champion to shoot a round of 70 and win was Phil Mickelson (third round) in 2000, while Olin Browne in 1999 was the last champion to post a score above par (73, first round) • Rod Pampling had a hole-in-one on the 188-yard, par-3 16th hole during the final round. Pampling used a 6-iron for the ace, the second one of the week and the 21st in tournament history. The last player to ace that hole was Hal Sutton in 2003, when he also used a 6-iron. • Rod Pampling, who started his round on the back nine, also eagled the par-5 first hole by knocking his third shot in from 93 feet, 2 inches. Pampling is the second player in two weeks to have an ace and another eagle in the same round. J. J. Henry during the third round of last week's AT&T Classic. • Rod Pampling became the first player to have two eagles in the same round here since 1999, when tournament winner Olin Browne had two in the final round (Nos. 1, 11) en route to a final-day 66. • Defending champion Tim Herron finished at 4-under 276 and tied for 46th place. • There were only six eagles this week, marking the lowest tournament total since 1994 when there were only three eagles recorded.
• David Toms moved into contention with a string of six consecutive birdies to move to 10-under after 11 holes. Toms started his round on the back nine and ran off six in a row starting at No. 15. During that streak, he holed birdies totaling 98 feet, 7 inches. His longest putt was from 44 feet 5 inches at No. 16 and the shortest was from just 3 feet, 9 inches at No. 2. The streak ended when he missed from 38 feet, 8 inches on No. 3. Toms finished with a 4-under 66 after a pair of late bogeys. • David Toms' streak of six consecutive birdies tied the longest such streak on the 2007 PGA TOUR. Anthony Kim reeled off six in a row during the opening round on Thursday. • This was Scott Verplank's 500th career start on the PGA TOUR. The 2007 EDS Byron Nelson Championship winner posted a final-round 71 and wound up T7. • Harrison Frazar tied for seventh this week, his best finish since a T7 at the 2006 Buick Open. Frazar finished T11 in Putting this week (28.0 avg.), which is a big improvement from his year-to-date rank of T121 (29.53 avg.). Frazar also led the tournament in Driving Distance (311.5). He ranks sixth on the season list at 300.4. • Bob Tway found the fairway more frequently this week. Tway ranked T2 in Driving Accuracy Percentage by hitting 43 of 56 fairways, a percentage of 76.79%. For the year, Tway ranks No. 179 with an average of 51.95%. • Billy Mayfair (67) was the only player to post a bogey-free final round. Mayfair played the final 30 holes without a bogey. • This is the first time since the PGA TOUR began keeping records in 1983 that all four rounds at Colonial Country Club were below par. • Steve Stricker led the field in par-5 scoring this week. Stricker was 6 under for the eight par 5s. He birdied the par 5 first hole in rounds 2, 3 and 4 and birdied the par-5 11th hole in rounds 1, 3 and 4. • The third and fourth rounds of the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial was played with "preferred lies." This is the fifth tournament on the 2007 PGA TOUR to feature a round using preferred lies. The others were the Mercedes-Benz Championship (Rounds 2-3-4), AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am (Rounds 1-2-3-4), WGC-CA Championship (Rounds 1-2) and the Shell Houston Open (Rounds 3-4). Copyright 2007 PGATOUR.com. All rights reserved. |
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