Floyd Can’t Be Caught This Time : Senior golf: He wins PGA by five shots to make up for collapse in 1994.

Ray Floyd slammed the door on any would-be challengers with a string of 14 consecutive pars in the PGA Seniors Championship, claiming the title he blew a year ago.

“Last year has nothing to do with it,” Floyd said Sunday after he turned a two-stroke lead into a five-shot victory and showed why he is one of golf’s great front-runners.

That reputation was damaged a year ago when, in the same tournament and on the same Champion course at the PGA Resort, he uncharacteristically blew a four-shot lead with eight holes to go and let Lee Trevino escape with the title.

Most of his self-inflicted damage came on the 15th and 17th holes, both water-guarded par-threes, which he played in 7 and 5.

This time he parred them routinely and cruised to his 10th victory on the over-50 circuit.

“He had a good memory. I thought maybe he would have forgotten what happened to him last year,” Trevino said.

But it didn’t happen.

“I put that behind me a year ago,” Floyd said. “If I had to dwell on bad shots, bad holes, bad tournaments, I don’t think I’d be here. I don’t play in the past. I play in the present.”

This time there were no glitches. He did not make a bogey. From the front, he birdied the third (from about 15 feet) and the fourth (from eight) and really wasn’t threatened.

“Basically, no one mounted a challenge,” he said after finishing with a 70 and a 277 total, 11 under.

It was his first victory of the year after three second-place finishes.

Trevino, on the mend from neck surgery and not yet a winner this year, birdied the last hole for a 71 and a tie for second at 282 with Larry Gilbert and John Paul Cain, each of whom shot 69.

Jack Nicklaus took himself out of it with three consecutive bogeys. He finished with 74 and a 284 total.