Price leads trio of Reifers, Lee and Schultz by two
BRIDGEPORT, WV –Rick Price isn’t the biggest hitter on the Nationwide Tour, but the 40-year old Floridian is typically among the most accurate. His accuracy paid dividends in Thursday’s opening round of the $1M Nationwide Tour Players Cup. Price cruised around the Pete Dye Golf Club in relative ease, missing only one fairway and one green en route to an afternoon 8-under-par 64 and a two-stroke lead over Kyle Reifers and morning finishers Jason Schultz and Won Joon Lee.Canada’s David Hearn posted a 5-under 67 and is tied for fifth in the Tour’s richest purse ever along with Bryce Molder, Skip Kendall, Chris Anderson, Scott Parel, Peter Tomasulo, Aron Price and Michael Boyd.
Of the top 12 players on the first-day leaderboard, Aron Price is the only player currently ranked among the top 25 on the money list. Price, the leader, is No. 46, Schultz is No. 62, Lee is No. 100 and Reifers is No. 36. A Tour-record $180,000 will be handed to Sunday’s winner – an amount that will all but guarantee the champion a place among THE 25 who will move onto the PGA TOUR in 2009.
Price’s accuracy was evident from the start. His pitching wedge from 106 yards on the opening hole landed a foot from the hole, jumped forward and spun back into the cup for an eagle-2. Two holes later, he nearly made another eagle but was forced to settle for a birdie, tapping in from two inches.
“Length isn’t a big deal here,” said Price of the 7,308-yard layout. “It’s long in spots but there are so many opportunities. There’s a par-5, number 17, which everybody can reach and you have wedge in your hand a bunch of times. You just need to place it more than bomb. You have to plot your way around.”
Price’s plotting was nearly perfect. His only bogey of the day came early in the round and was of the three-putt variety.
“I feel like I’ve been playing well,” said Price, who has missed the cut in seven of his last nine starts. “I just haven’t been scoring and getting a lot out of my rounds.”
The last time Price scored this well came in the opening round of the BMW Charity Pro-Am two months ago in Greenville, SC, where he shot an 8-under 64 to grab the first-round lead, Price stumbled with scores of 74-72-73 and tied for 46th. Since then, he hasn’t made a cut in four starts.
Schultz and Lee posted their numbers early in the day and held the clubhouse lead for much of the day. Reifers, a 24-year old Wake Forest grad, challenged for the top spot late in the day. A birdie-eagle combination had him within one of the leader with three holes to go but he suffered a bogey at the final hole to drop back into a tie for second.
Schultz, who has missed the cut in four of his last five starts, finally started getting some putts to drop. The University of Missouri grad has struggled in recent weeks and has fallen 27 places on the money list to No. 62.
“Believe it or not, I’ve been playing good. I just haven’t had a putt go in for a while,” he said. “I just needed something to happen. I’ve been trying to be patient but I honestly haven’t done a very good job of it the last couple weeks. That was my goal this week – to be patient.”
Schultz had several chances early in his round but didn’t get a birdie putt to fall until reaching his seventh hole of the day. With the lid finally off the cup, Schultz went on a birdie run, with six in an eight-hole stretch.
“It was a task because I was hitting it about 10 feet on every hole and I didn’t make any of them,” he said. “Then I get one to go in that I wasn’t expecting to make. I wouldn’t say I putted great but it was one of my better putting days. I’m just trying to trust what I’m doing and not think about my stroke so much because you can get so caught up in being mechanical.”
The 22-year old Lee, a Korean-born Australian who didn’t take up the game until 2000, was a bit erratic off the tee but kept giving himself plenty of birdie chances. He had three birdies and an eagle on the par-5s, which helped offset a pair of bogeys.
“I didn’t drive it great the entire round,” said the Tour’s leader in average driving distance (311.9 yards). “I hit some good iron shots that set up some birdies.”
Lee sees a different game than most. His version of the fairway consists of “inside the tree lines” and in that respect, he stayed out of trouble until he reached the 497-yard, par-4, 18th hole. His tee shot wound up in the trees down the right side and it resulted in a closing bogey that dropped him out of the outright lead at the time.
“Everything is in play here if you can get a shot at the green,” said Lee, who is No. 100 on the money list and could use this week’s record purse to move up. “I feel good on the tees here. It feels very open to me. I didn’t hit many in the fairway but I kept most of my drives in play.”
First-Round Notes – Lift, clean and place conditions were in effect for the opening round, which was delayed 80 minutes due to morning fog…The final groups putted out at 8:52 p.m.…Players who were bogey-free in the opening round: Jason Schultz (66), Skip Kendall (67), Scott Parel (67), Aron Price (67), Greg Chalmers (68), Jon Turcott (69),…David Hearn and Rick Price both opened with eagle-2s on the 390-yard, 10th hole Thursday. There was only one eagle recorded on that hole during four rounds last year…The first-round scoring average was 71.674…34 players in the field of 144 broke 70; 75 broke par and 89 were at par-or-better.
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