Azinger Has Task Ahead

Paul Azinger couldn’t finish what he started Saturday in the third round of the rain-plagued Memorial at Dublin, Ohio. He had to settle for something else--holding Tiger Woods off for at least another day.

Azinger made two birdies on the back nine as darkness began to set on the course to keep the same two-shot margin he began with on a day when rain delays pushed back play so much the leaders were unable to finish their rounds.

Play was suspended twice and the leaders waited four hours past their tee times to actually play as rain, hail and lightning moved across the Muirfield Village Golf Club once again.

“I’m disappointed we have to come back in the morning,” Azinger said.

Azinger knocked in a 12-footer on the 13th hole to get to 11 under, two strokes ahead of Woods and Sergio Garcia, who were playing together in the group ahead. Also at nine under was Stuart Appleby, who birdied the 15th hole before quitting for the day.

Azinger, Woods and Garcia all finished 14 holes before having to quit.

Players left on the course marked their balls and were scheduled to return this morning to finish their third rounds before the final round.

Woods, playing with Garcia in a pairing that drew most of the crowds who stayed during the delays, was in the lead by himself after a birdie on the seventh hole. But he didn’t make another birdie, and he bogeyed the short par-three 12th.

Tom Wargo bogeyed his final hole to fall into a tie for first place with Sammy Rachels and Leonard Thompson in the BellSouth Senior Classic at Nashville.

Wargo was at 10 under through 12 holes when two bad wedge shots cost him two bogeys and his lead, and he wound up with a three-under 69 for a 36-hole total of eight-under 136.

Thompson started the second round four strokes off the pace set by overnight leaders Rachels and Allen Doyle, but he carded the best round with a bogey-free 66. Rachels had a three-birdie, one-bogey 70.

Defending champion Hale Irwin (68) was a stroke back at 137 with Andy North (69), Mike Hill (69), Dana Quigley (69) and Howard Twitty (70).