Mickelson & Finau Further Strengthen Ryder Cup ‘Wildcard’ Selection At Northern Trust.

7 years ago by Comments Off on Mickelson & Finau Further Strengthen Ryder Cup ‘Wildcard’ Selection At Northern Trust.

Panamus, New Jersey ..

The duo of Phil Mickelson and Tony Finau continued to boost hopes of Ryder Cup selection in moving into a share of the lead on day two of the Northern Trust.

Mickelson added a second straight three-under par 68 to move to six-under while Finau birdied two of his closing three holes in a 67 to join Mickelson atop of the board near lunch in the opening event of the FedEx Cup ‘Play-Off Series’.

Also in the Ridgewood Country Club clubhouse at six-under is fellow Americans Peter Uihlein (68), Patrick Cantlay (67) along with Canadian Adam Hadwin (65).

Mickelson, and commencing his round from the ninth hole, was off to a flyer with four starting birdied and race to seven-under par and while he dropped a shot at his fifth hole (13th on the scorecard) the World No. 22 moved back to seven-under with a birdie at the next.

Mickelson went to the lead at eight-under with an 11th hole birdie before taking some of the gloss from his display with a pair of closing bogeys.

It was still one of Mickelson’s lowest 36-hole opening round totals all season including his five-under par first two-round tally on route to victory last March in the WGC – Mexico Championship.

“My game is getting better as the week goes on and as I get more and more confident because I’ve been striking the ball well and my touch on the greens has been coming back,” he said.

“I’ve been making some putts.  It’s one of those things where I feel like as the week goes.

“It’s just disappointing to finish any round like that because you want to finish it off strong, but I drove it today the way I’ve been driving it.”

Mickelson failed to qualify automatically for next month’s USA Ryder Cup team but would seem overwhelming assured of earning a ‘wildcard’ pick when Captain, Jim Furyk announces on September 5th three of four Versailles selections.

One of those three is strongly rumoured to also be Finau and in what would be a maiden USA Ryder Cup team cap.

The 28-year old Utah-born golfer, and playing in the same group as Mickelson, commenced his round at two-under par before muscling his way to seven-under par with five birdies in his opening 11 holes.

And somewhat like Mickelson, he closed-off his round with a 15th hole bogey, a 17th hole birdie and then bogeyed his 18th.

Finau had finished 15th and seven places shy of selection at the close of USA Team automatic qualifying following last fortnight’s PGA Championship.

But after three top-10s in the three earlier Majors of the year, Finau found himself drawn with Furyk for the opening two rounds in St. Louis.

And while his Versailles selection is being tipped by many, Finau is more concerned with focussing on a second PGA Tour victory.

“It’s in the very far back of my mind,” he said.

“I have a golf tournament to focus on, the Northern Trust is a tournament that’s the first leg of the Play-Offs.

“One of my big goals is to get into the Tour Championship.  I want to do that this week and just continue to play well, and all the chips will fall in place for me.

“Of course, to say that I’m not thinking about The Ryder Cup, is definitely not true.  But it’s not the most important thing right now.  I want to play good golf and get myself in contention this week.

“If it continues to prove to the captain and to the guys that make the choice, make the picks, that I’m worthy of a spot, then that’s the case.

“But all I can do is just, you know, put my best foot forward this week and play some good golf.  So, I’ve got off to a nice start this week, and look forward to continuing this good play Saturday and Sunday.”



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