Kokrak finishes at Pebble Beach tied for ninth

Staff/wire report

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif.

Warren JFK graduate Jason Korak finished the PGA Tour Pebble Beach National Pro Am tied for ninth place with five other golfers.

On Sunday, Kokrak shot a 2-under 70 and finished 9-under for the four day tournament, eight strokes behind tournament winner Phil Mickelson. It's Kokrak's first top 10 finish in his two months on the PGA Tour.

Tiger Woods shot a 3-over par 75 to finish at -8.

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif.

Jason Korak shot an even-par 72 on Saturday and will play in his first Sunday of the PGA Tour season.

Kokrak is tied for 12th at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am and will play alongside Vijay Singh today. It is the first time in five Tour events that Kokrak has advanced to Sunday play.

He’s seven shots behind leader Charlie Wi.

Coming off an early bogey that put him eight shots behind, Tiger Woods was in a bunker to the left of the 13th fairway when he cut a 9-iron too much, sending it right of the green toward deep rough.

The ball caromed off a mound and onto the green and started rolling. And rolling. When it finally settled a foot below the hole, and the gallery’s cheers grew increasingly louder, Woods hung his head and smiled.

He went from possible bogey to unlikely birdie.

And with five birdies in a six-hole stretch, he went from the periphery of contention to the thick of it.

“Looked like I was having a tough time making par, and I was making birdie, and off we go,” Woods said. “Sometimes, we need those types of momentum swings in a round, and from there, I made some putts.”

If nothing else, he made it interesting going into the final round of his PGA Tour debut.

Wi played bogey-free at Spyglass Hill for a 3-under 69 to build a three-shot lead over Ken Duke, who had a 65 on the Shore Course at Monterey Peninsula.

Woods had a 5-under 67, his best Saturday score on the PGA Tour since the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, and climbed within four shots of the lead. It’s the closest he has been to a 54-hole leader on the PGA Tour since the 2010 Masters.

Not only is Woods in the penultimate group — right in front of two players who have never won on the PGA Tour — he will be in the same group as Phil Mickelson, who had a 70 at Pebble Beach despite playing the par 5s in 1 over.

Still in the mix is two-time Pebble Beach champion Dustin Johnson, former world No. 1 Vijay Singh and three-time major champion Padraig Harrington, who was two shots off the lead at one point until a sloppy finish at Spyglass for a 72.

Wi is 0-for-162 on the PGA Tour and now has to face his demons of self-doubt — along with a familiar force in golf.

Woods couldn’t convert a share of the third-round lead with Robert Rock two weeks ago in Abu Dhabi, but he is showing an upward trend. He has given himself a chance to win on the back nine of his last four stroke-play tournaments.

With a new swing, it’s starting to look like the old Tiger.

“But the scenario doesn’t change,” Woods said. “The ultimate goal is to win a golf tournament.”