Irwin Wins by One Shot Over Wadkins

Hale Irwin wrested the lead from Lanny Wadkins with a two-shot swing on the fourth hole and went on to score a one-stroke victory Sunday in the Memorial golf tournament at Dublin, Ohio.

The steady veteran needed only a closing round of par 72 in gusty winds to end a 15-month victory drought with the 17th win of his 18-year career.

Irwin won this one with a seven-under-par 281 total on Jack Nicklaus’ Muirfield Village Golf Club course and joined the tournament host and founder as the only two-time Memorial winners.

The victory, Irwin’s first since the 1984 Bing Crosby National Pro-Am, was worth $100,000 from the total purse of $600,000 and lifted Irwin’s earnings for the year to $159,266.

Wadkins, already the winner of two titles this year, had a one-stroke lead when the day’s play began, but lost it when he bogeyed the fourth from a bunker and Irwin made birdie, dropping a 12-foot putt.

Wadkins never led again. He bogeyed four times in a five-hole stretch beginning on the eighth, once trailed by four shots, but made it close with a birdie on the 15th and bogeys by Irwin on the 16th and 18th.

Wadkins finished with a 74 and had a 282 total. He collected $60,000.

Bill Kratzert, playing with Irwin and Wadkins in the last group, had a 73 and took third at 284.

George Burns, Keith Fergus and Corey Pavin, winner of last week’s Colonial National Invitation Tournament, were next at 286. Burns closed with a 69, Pavin shot 70 and Fergus matched par 72.

Patti Rizzo sank a 25-foot birdie putt on the 16th hole and shot a one-under-par 71 to win the $250,000 LPGA Corning tournament at Corning, N.Y.

Rizzo then saved par with a six-foot putt on the 17th to hold off the challenge of Australian Jane Crafter.

Rizzo finished with a total of 16-under 272 at Corning Country Club, matching the tournament record set by Patty Sheehan in 1983. It was also one stroke off the LPGA record set by Hollis Stacy in the 1977 Rail Charity tournament.

The victory was worth $37,500 to Rizzo and boosted her season’s earnings to more than $69,000.

Crafter finished second with a 273 after shooting a final-round 69.