Pavin Is a Winner on Final Hole : He Defeats Langer With a Birdie on 18

When close friends Corey Pavin and Bernhard Langer walked down the 18th fairway Sunday, tied for the lead on the 90th and final hole of the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic, they put their arms around each other’s shoulders and waved to the cheering gallery of about 20,000.

“It’s just a little Sunday game, coming down to the last hole,” Pavin said.

“Let’s make it an exciting finish,” Langer said.

Pavin took him up on it.

After watching Langer slide his birdie putt about four feet to the right of the cup, Pavin hit his dead center from 18 feet to win the tournament by one stroke.

He did it with a remarkable five-under par 67 on the final day at PGA West, the best score of the week on the torturous desert course, to finish with a 341 total, 19 under par.

For Pavin, 27, it was his fifth victory in a little more than three years on the PGA tour since leaving UCLA. It was also his largest payday, $162,000.

Langer’s consolation was a $97,200 check, which he won for finishing second at 342, 18 under, after shooting 70 Sunday.

The other member of the featured threesome, Mark Calcavecchia, shot 72 to finish third at 345, 15 under.

PGA West did not allow anyone else to mount a challenge, although the course yielded slightly Sunday because of the perfect weather conditions and perhaps also because of the experience the players gained when they played one of the four previous rounds there.

There were five rounds in the 60s, which is as many as there had been all last week at PGA West. Eighteen of the 71 players broke par, seven others matched it.

But all that means is that the course did not win as decisively as it had on the other days. Call this one a TKO.

Among the leaders after Saturday’s fourth round who were humbled by PGA West were Jeff Sluman, who shot 76, David Edwards and Johnny Miller, who shot 77s, and Willie Wood, who shot 78.

Calcavecchia easily could have let his round get away from him after his second shot on the par-five fifth hole landed in the fairway and then rolled and rolled and rolled until it plopped into the water.

On a fair golf course, perfect shots don’t sleep with the fishes. But no one said PGA West is fair.

Calcavecchia threw his club, then bogeyed the hole. Still agitated, he double-bogeyed the next one.

“That shot should never have gone into the water, Calcavecchia said. “It was a bad break.”

Even after shooting 67, Pavin had no kind words for the course.

“To be completely honest and give you something you can print, it’s too severe,” he said.

“If you don’t hit the ball very, very well, it’s hard to shoot even par. You should have a chance to chip and putt the ball and score even when you’re not hitting the ball well. There are holes here where you have to make tremendous shots just to par.

“This is one of the best rounds I’ve played in a long time, and I shot five under. I don’t call that taming it. Five or six under is the best score you’ll see here over the next few years.”

Pavin didn’t say anything about PGA West that other pros hadn’t already said. In fact, he said quite a bit less than some.

If it makes them feel any better, the course designer, Pete Dye, doesn’t necessarily disagree. After all, Dr. Frankenstein also thought his creation got out of hand on occasion.

“If I had to play four rounds here to make a living, I’d want to kill Pete Dye at my first opportunity,” Dye said Sunday.

Yet, Pavin completed the round without a bogey, only the second player who could make that claim at PGA West. T.C. Chen, who shot 68, did it earlier Sunday.

For Pavin, it was his third straight round without a bogey. His last one was on No. 16 Thursday at Bermuda Dunes, 56 holes ago. He shot 65 Friday at Tamarisk and 66 Saturday at Indian Wells.

“That’s the best three consecutive rounds I’ve played,” he said. “Ever.”

When play started Sunday, Langer, the 1985 Masters champion from West Germany, led by one over Calcavecchia and two over Pavin and Sluman.

Langer looked as if he might extend his lead on the first hole with a 24-foot birdie putt, but Pavin matched him with one from 25.

“I didn’t want him to be too far out of reach,” said Pavin, a native Southern Californian who is moving soon to Florida.

“When he made the putt, I knew I had to respond quickly. I didn’t know I would respond that quickly.”

Pavin moved into a tie after he birdied from 30 feet on the third hole and Langer bogeyed the fifth. But Langer regained control with a birdie from three feet on No. 6 and improved his lead to two strokes with an eight-foot birdie putt on the 11th.

Then began Langer’s adventures with the rake, which is something out of either Edgar Allan Poe or Better Homes & Gardens.

His drive on the par-4 No. 12 was headed toward the fairway bunker, which wasn’t good. But the ball hit a rake that is used to tidy the bunker and stopped on the embankment. That’s worse.

After receiving an official ruling, he moved the rake without disturbing the ball. But, having to stand on the edge of the bunker, his right foot slipped. His second shot went over the green, where he had to get another ruling because he had an unplayable lie.

PGA official Mike Shea must have thought he was going to be on television more in this tournament than Bob Hope.

Langer managed to get down in two for a par, but he lost sole possession of the lead after Pavin made birdie putts from seven feet on No. 12 and six feet on No. 13.

The tie was broken two holes later, when Langer’s drive into a fairway bunker again was stopped on the bank by a rake.

“Players and caddies shouldn’t leave rakes lying on the bank,” Langer said. “The PGA should tell them not to leave the rakes there. It can effect the outcome of a tournament.”

When Langer bogeyed the hole, it was the first time since early Friday that he didn’t have at least a share of the lead.

But he rebounded on the par-5 No. 16, reaching the green on his second shot and two-putting from 12 feet for a birdie.

“The pressure was on him because it was the first time he had been caught,” Pavin said. “Then he made birdie on 16. That’s the mark of a great player.”

As they walked down the fairway together on the final hole, it appeared as if the Hope might be decided by a playoff for the sixth straight year.

Pavin quickly ended that thought.

“For Corey to shoot 67 on this golf course, with the pin placements the way they were, it’s incredible,” said Langer, who become friends with Pavin when both were on the European Tour in 1983.

“To birdie the last hole is outstanding. It’s one of the hardest holes in golf.

“I don’t feel I lost the tournament. It just so happened that somebody else played better than me.”

After Pavin’s final putt fell, he leaped about five feet into the air.

“I jumped about 20 miles,” he said.

One good thing about being the champion is that no one quibbles when you exaggerate.

Pavin called his 18-foot winning putt a 25-footer.

“I’ll probably call it 40 feet next week,” he said.