Page 17 - Golf Champion - February 2021

Kim was set to finish.
Entering the island green of the par-3 17th, better known
as Alcatraz, Kim hoped to escape with a par but instead
escaped with a birdie and a lead he’d never relinquish,
rolling in a 19-foot breaker that seemed to only have one
roll left in before it dumped in the front and sent Kim
into a fist-pumping frenzy.
“I wanted, at least I want to go to make the playoff, so
I tried to focus on speed and then actually Max Homa's
putt helped me a lot, so I knew how it goes,” Kim said.
“So I just focused on speed and I hit it very confidently.”
Ironically, Kim’s latest victory once again comes on
a Pete Dye-designed golf course, but that wasn’t the
only similarity between Sunday in La Quinta and his
PLAYERS win almost four years ago. At TPC Sawgrass,
Kim’s signature moment came when he ripped driver-
off-the-deck from the right rough on the par-4 14th on
to the green en route to victory. He went back to the well
on Sunday, pulling driver from the middle of the fairway
on the par-5 11th with 290 to the hole and water staring
at him just left of the green.
“Yeah, I hit driver today on No. 11. There was water on
left side, and I thought I had enough distance for my
driver,” Kim said. “So I tried to keep it safe, so that's why
I didn't hit the 3-wood and then I tried to use the mound
on the right side, so that's why I hit the driver-off-the-
deck there.”

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