U.S. OPEN : Watson? Nicklaus? Surprise! : Golf: Names from the past turn back the clock to top the leader board at Oakmont.

Golf. . . . It’s not the game that Jack built, although he has been around so long it might seem that way.

On a sweltering Thursday at Oakmont Country Club, Jack Nicklaus set out, club in hand, searching for another bit of golf history.

Nicklaus is a four-time winner of the U.S. Open, which no one has won more often.

Could there be a fifth?

Hey, anything’s possible at the U.S. Open, where in the first round, nine golfers beat par, 132 didn’t, 18 were still on the course when play was suspended because of lightning in the area, and 54-year-old Jack Nicklaus shot 69 and stood only one shot off the first-round lead.

In fact, had it not been for the magic of another revived relic, 44-year-old Tom Watson, Nicklaus would have had the day just about to himself.

Watson shot 68, putting himself a stroke ahead of Nicklaus, three-time champion Hale Irwin, Ernie Els of South Africa and Frank Nobilo of New Zealand.

Among them, Watson, Nicklaus and Irwin have eight U.S. Open titles.

The Open is familiar ground for Watson, who has played it 22 other times. He won in 1982 at Pebble Beach and could have won in 1983 at Oakmont and again in 1987 at the Olympic Club in San Francisco, but finished second both times.

Watson’s round featured four birdies, a bogey at No. 8 when his three-iron shot sailed over the green into the back bunker, and three dramatic saves for par that made his day.

The most special was Watson’s par on 12. His drive lodged against a sprinkler head in the fairway, 250 yards from the green. After taking a drop, he pushed his second shot into the right rough, knocked a sand wedge short of the green, then pitched a sand wedge to six feet and rolled in the putt for par.

When he had said Wednesday that 95% of the field didn’t have a chance, Watson declined to identify in which percentage he belonged.

He changed his mind Thursday, saying that he’s in the 5% that can win it.

If Nicklaus can do it, then Watson can do it, he said.

“There’s no reason why not,” Watson added.

But Nicklaus’ effort had surprise going for it. Who could have seen it coming? Certainly not Nicklaus, who was as stunned as anybody.

“I am not surprised,” Nicklaus said. “I suppose I am amazed.

“My wife told me this morning, ‘You are 22! You are 22!’ I said, ‘I accept it.’ ”

His 69 was a little hard to accept, though.

Nicklaus, who won the Open in 1962, 1967, 1972 and 1980, hasn’t finished higher than 33rd in the last seven Opens. He hasn’t won a regular tour event since the 1986 Masters, hasn’t made the cut in the six tournaments he has played on the regular tour and until Thursday had not shot a round under 70.

“I have just played poorly,” Nicklaus said. “It is hard to concentrate when you are hitting where I have been hitting it.

“Anytime I have been able to find my golf ball, I have been able to concentrate and I found my golf ball today.”

At No. 18, Nicklaus found it at the bottom of the hole after rolling in a 40-foot putt on a green with so many undulations they serve as speed bumps.

The gallery cheered as the ball disappeared at the end of its long journey and Nicklaus closed his eyes, raised his arms, then covered his head with his hands.

Explaining his strategy on the putt, he said, “All I was trying to do was figure out some way to get it close enough to make a second putt and the ball went in.”

It was not the only time the ball acted unpredictably.

Fred Couples, who is four shots back at 72, eagled the 315-yard 17th after he drove the green. Then on No. 18, he three-putted from 12 feet for a bogey.

Arnold Palmer, 64, playing in his last U.S. Open, shot 77, four strokes better than 28-year-old John Daly.

Nobilo, who has never played in the U.S. Open, eagled No. 10.

There were seven eagles, but for a lot of people, there were times when the ball just wouldn’t go in.

Els rimmed an eight-footer at 18 that would have given him the lead, but the 24-year-old South African wasn’t too worried about what the missed putt meant.

He said he is reconsidering his plan of avoiding pressure by downplaying his chances.

“Now I think things might change in the next three days,” he said. “I might have to think that I am up there now.”

Curtis Strange made a double bogey on 18, which dropped him to 70, two shots behind Watson and tied with Jumbo Ozaki, Kirk Triplett and Scott Verplank.

Strange had all kinds of trouble at 18. He hit his driver into the right rough and his second shot left, the ball rolling to the edge of a bunker. With a bad lie, Strange hit his third shot short, chipped to 10 feet and two-putted.

Still, it was the kind of round that encouraged Strange, a two-time Open winner.

“Hopefully I can sleep on that, instead of the last hole,” he said.

Watson could sleep, secure in the knowledge that his game is better than it has been in some time. In 11 PGA Tour events, he has three top-10 finishes. More important, he is playing a course well suited to him, one on which he doesn’t have to shoot 22 under par to win.

“I’ve been playing well,” he said. “There’s no reason why I can’t continue to play well. It’s not a fluke.”

Since he lost two major titles, the 1978 PGA and the 1983 U.S. Open, on the back nine at Oakmont, it wouldn’t be surprising if Watson said he thought this place owed him one.

“I don’t, not really,” he said. “I think I’ve made too much out of it. I’m very happy I’ve played at Oakmont, played very well on a very difficult golf course.

“Maybe this will be the time Watson wins at Oakmont.”