Palm Beach Gardens – Tiger is back… sort of.
The Big Cat will make his competitive return Tuesday night, in an effort to tie up the best two out of three format of the TGL Finals at SoFi Center on Tuesday night. Woods told ESPN after Match 1, that he will play in Match 2, a decision he revealed after Jupiter Links lost a 6-5 nail-biter to Los Angeles Golf Club in the opener Monday night.
Woods has sat out the entire season as he recovers from back surgery last October. Jupiter Links had been using Akshay Bhatia as an alternate, but Bhatia is playing the Hero Indian Open this week in New Delhi on the European tour.
Against L.A. of Justin Rose, Tommy Fleetwood and Sahith Theegala on Monday, Jupiter employed, Max Homa, Tom Kim and Kevin Kisner. Kisner, has been broadcasting PGA Tour golf most of the past few months, having been used sparingly by Jupiter Links.
Theegala struggled to keep his tee shots in play throughout the night, but on the pivotal final hole of the match vs Kisner down 5-4, LA threw the hammer. Theegala found the shortgrass, setting up an easy birdie to seal the match and give Los Angeles the win. He seemed more relieved than elated afterwards, “Just like I said, these guys trusted me, and that was a large part of why I felt so good about the last tee shot. They were in my ear a lot about just keep executing, we’re in this match. We’re still in a good position, even coming down to the end. We have a chance to win; that’s all we can really ask for. It was a lot of belief from the guys that helped me calm down over the shot and step up and hit that drive.”
Earlier in the night, Theegala hit two tee shots out of play and another that found a bunker, keeping L.A. from reaching the par 5 in two shots.
So Tuesday Match 2 is win or go home – March Madness Golf Edition. If Tiger and the Jup Crew are able to survive, Match 3 would start immediately after Match 2 – at 9pm. Everyone wants to know about whether he’ll return for Augusta in two weeks’ time. When I asked him about it last week at TGL, he seemed frustrated with his progress… “I said I’ve been working on it. Sometimes I have good days, sometimes I have bad days. Disk replacement is not a lot of fun.”
Tonight he makes his return to the spotlight with clubs in hand, and now at 50, he has a chance to win another championship title… but he’ll need the help of his Jupiter Links teammates to pull it off.
