Saturday Meijer LPGA Classic news and notes
By Jeff Babineau
Rookie Ruffels has a veteran’s nerves
LPGA rookie Gabriela Ruffels stood on the 17th tee late Friday afternoon, one shot outside of the 36-hole cutline at the Meijer LPGA Classic for Simply Give. Only 24, Ruffels had the presence to turn to her caddie and say, “This is such a good test.”
What did she do from there? She finished birdie-birdie to earn a spot in the field at Blythefield Country Club for the weekend. Saturday, she went out in the third round and shot 4-under 68, steadily moving up the leaderboard, climbing all the way into a tie for 24th.
The 24-year-old from Australia, a former standout tennis player, was last year’s Epson Tour Player of the Year, winning three times. This season on the LPGA, she has three third-place finishes, and finds herself in a tight race with Korea’s Jin Hee Im (two top 10s) for LPGA Rookie of the Year.
“To be able to pull that off, it’s even good practice for if you’re in contention to win a tournament,” Ruffels said when asked Saturday about her Friday finish. “Doesn’t matter what it is; still the same nerves. You have to pull off a couple of good shots. I was happy that I was able to have that experience in a tournament, and glad I was able to get it done.”
She also was thankful for two bonus days of golf, which allows her to work on some parts of her game under tournament conditions.
“That’s all you can ask for,” Ruffels said after her four-birdie, no-bogey round on Saturday. “There’s no better practice.”
Lincicome climbing on the weekend
Brittany Lincicome has won eight times on the LPGA, and has played on six U.S. Solheim Cup teams, so she knows what it takes to taste success. Lately, though, she’s been in a bit of a rut. She entered the Meijer LPGA Classic having missed the cut six times in her last seven starts, including last week at ShopRite, where she shot 65-75.
But Lincicome is forever tinkering and working to find something, always looking to get better. A week ago, she liked what she saw out of a putter change – she moved from an Odyssey Two-Ball into an Odyssey Jailbird – and this week’s she’s been working to find a driver that she can trust.
On Saturday, having shot 70-71 to make the cut, Lincicome, who has dealt with a thumb injury in the past two seasons, turned in her best effort of the week, shooting 3-under 69. She thought the round might turn out better – she actually did all of her damage on the opening nine, making a rare eagle-2 at the par-4 ninth to shoot 33 – but made nine pars, and no birdies, on her final nine.
“A different mindset,” is how Lincicome described her week. At ShopRite, if she holed a long putt for birdie or par, she chalked it up to fortune, or pure luck. This week, when she makes a putt, or pulls off a shot she is trying to hit, she is more generous in giving herself credit.
“It’s more like, we did everything we were supposed to do,” Lincicome said. “I’m giving myself a little more credit in acknowledging the good shots and the good putts that we’re hitting.”
As for her eagle at the 401-yard ninth? Well, that was a bonus. Lincicome said she could not have sprayed her drive any farther right than she did. The ball hit some trees and bounced back close to the gallery ropes. From there, she still had 215 yards to the flagstick, and she hit 7-wood. She was surprised to hear the gallery’s sudden roar, meaning something very good had happened. Her caddie took a glance through a rangefinder to confirm the ball had gone in. Eagle.
“I’ve had wedge into that hole before,” Lincicome said, “and I can’t even make a birdie. Maybe 7-wood is the play (she laughed). You would have thought I’d do more on the back nine. But I tightened up a little bit, pulled a couple of shorties for birdies, and here we are.”
Lincicome, who lives along Florida’s Gulf Coast, will play in Seattle next week (KPMG Women’s PGA) and then will be back in Michigan in two weeks for the Dow Championship, a two-player team event. Lincicome will be part of Team Brittany along with her former Solheim Cup teammate, Brittany Lang.
She has all the right O’Tooles
Ryann O’Toole had 129 yards left into Blythefield’s par-4 16th hole Saturday afternoon, took aim at some tall treetops behind the green, and pulled the trigger on her pitching wedge.
Then ... she waited. And waited.
“I couldn't even see the pin,” said O’Toole, who played her way into contention on Saturday at the Meijer LPGA with a third-round 67 that kept her within earshot of the leader with one round to play.
“But when I hit it, I'm like, OK, that's right on the target. Then I just waited. You kind of wait for claps up there that tell you, OK, that was good.”
The 16th hole at Blythefield measures 374 yards, with a second shot played straight up a hill to an elevated green. Because a player sees no more than the top of the flagstick, at most, it creates an uncomfortable, uneasy shot. It usually plays as one of the tougher holes on the second nine.
“It's a hard hole to figure out,” O’Toole said. “You're coming up, it's 13 yards up, and sometimes it's like, OK, it released eight yards; OK, that released four yards the other day, and you're like, what is it going to release here?”
This time, it released just right, O’Toole’s ball vanishing into the hole for the first eagle of the week at 16.
“I got it right,” said O’Toole, who will begin Sunday trailing leader Grace Kim by six shots.
O'Toole's best finish in 2024 is a playoff loss to Nelly Korda at the FIR HILLS SERI PAK Championship in Los Angeles.
