Douglass Is Winner in Playoff : Senior golf: He overcomes Dent, who blows a three-shot lead with five holes left at Rancho Park.

Jim Dent hit a 293-yard drive with a two-iron on the first playoff hole but still lost to Dale Douglass in the $650,000 Ralphs Senior Classic at Rancho Park on Sunday.

Dent blew a three-shot lead with five holes to play as the two finished at 196, 17 under for the 54-hole event. They returned to the 18th hole, a 393-yard par four, for the playoff.

Dent, who barely saved par to force a playoff after hitting an errant two-iron on the 18th a few minutes earlier, came back with the same club for the extra hole.

Dent pushed the shot onto the cart path on the right. The ball seemed to roll forever down the concrete path and came to rest about 100 yards from the hole. He had to hit a seven-iron from under a tree, and the ball skipped over the green. He bogeyed.

Meanwhile, Douglass, who barely missed an eight-footer for a birdie that would have won in regulation, made two more excellent shots to put himself less than five feet from the cup.

“I had two shots to win,” Douglass said after his first victory of the year, “and I was lagging. The lag went in, and it ended an exciting day for me.”

Douglass and Dent shot seven-under 64s on the final round to finish three shots ahead of Jim Albus, Isao Aoki and George Archer.

The way the day started, it appeared that Archer, who was tied with Aoki and Larry Ziegler one shot ahead of Douglass and Dent, would wrap it up early.

Archer, the best-putting tall golfer in history--he stands 6 feet 5--made four birdies in the first six holes to go to 15 under and a three-shot lead. Raymond Floyd’s tournament record of 18 under appeared in danger.

Archer’s run, which included a victory in the tournament at Sacramento last week, then came to an abrupt halt. On the last three holes of the front nine, there was a five-stroke switch as Archer double-bogeyed the 168-yard par-three seventh and Dent had a birdie and an eagle on the eighth and ninth, both par fives.

Dent, having finally learned the front side was no tougher than the back, made birdies on 10 and 11 to go 18 under and apparently take charge of the tournament, supposedly made to order for the tour’s longest hitter.

But there was something bothering Dent all day, and maybe it caught up with him. Dent likes to play quickly. The trio of Albus, Jim Ferree and Bruce Crampton kept Dent, Douglass and Al Geiberger waiting on most shots all day. After a long wait on the 17th, a 190-yard par three, Dent pushed his tee shot near a tree and there was a two-shot switch that tied the leaders when Dent bogeyed and Douglass sank a 25-foot putt for a birdie.

“It bothered me,” Dent said of the delay. “Maybe it caused the bad shot.”

Douglass is the methodical type, a prime example of a patient golfer. “I didn’t notice it was slow out there,” he said. “After all, I didn’t have anything else to do today.

“It’s too bad that anyone who shot 17 under par had to lose, but actually, I should have won it in regulation.

“I hit what I thought were the two best shots I ever hit on 18 the first time and wound up just eight feet from the pin. I already had made two putts of 25 feet and another of five for birdies in the last few holes. I thought this was in, too, but it didn’t curve until after it went by the hole.

“But I got a second chance and hit two shots even better than the previous two to put myself in position to win. I couldn’t have waited much longer to win a tournament.”

After blowing his two-shot lead on the 17th, Dent put his two-iron shot down the left side on 18. His approach went left almost into the scorer’s tent. His chip to the green left him with an eight-foot putt for par, which he rammed in the cup. The next time, he played the hole even worse.