Scott validates season, ranking with a victory

Moving closer to realizing his potential, Adam Scott had his best year in golf. He finished third on the PGA Tour money list, and can move as high as No. 3 in the world ranking over the next two months.

None of that would have mattered without a PGA Tour victory.

Scott took care of that missing piece Sunday in the Tour Championship by holding off every challenge, closing with a four-under-par 66 to win the season finale by three shots over Jim Furyk in Atlanta.

“You can’t be that [No.] 3 or 4 player in the world without winning tournaments,” Scott said. “That shouldn’t happen. I feel more comfortable in that position seeing I’ve won an event.”

He won convincingly at the PGA Tour’s version of an All-Star game.

Staked to a three-shot lead on a cool autumn afternoon at East Lake, he sank a slick, 15-foot birdie putt on No. 3 to turn back an early threat from Vijay Singh. When he saw Furyk and Joe Durant make a move, Scott responded with three birdies in a four-hole stretch around the turn.

For good measure, he turned bogey into birdie by holing a bunker shot on the 13th.

“That was a chance for us to pick up a shot, and we ended up losing a shot,” Furyk said. “A guy gets a three- or four-shot lead and he keeps making birdies, he’s tough to catch.”

Scott finished at 11-under 269 and earned $1.17 million to finish his PGA Tour season with nearly $5 million. With tournaments coming up in Australia, he will have a chance to surpass Phil Mickelson at No. 3 in the world ranking by the end of the year.

Furyk shot a 65 to match low round of the week but never got closer than two strokes and trailed by as many as five on the back nine.

He played bogey-free golf over his final 31 holes, and it was meaningful. Furyk won the Vardon Trophy for the first time with the lowest adjusted scoring average on tour at 68.86.

Scott was second at 68.95.

Tiger Woods had the lowest average (68.11) but failed to play the required 60 rounds. Woods skipped the Tour Championship for the first time, although he still would have come up one round short even if he had played.

“I’m wondering if anyone is going to put an asterisk on it because Tiger didn’t play enough rounds,” Furyk said. “But it’s a nice honor. It’s icing on the cake for a good year and a consistent year.”

Durant closed with a 67 to finish third at 273 and end his season with a stunning turnaround. He was worried about keeping his card three months ago, then finished the year with five straight top-10 finishes, including a victory at Disney. He wound up 13th on the money list, making him eligible for all four majors next year.

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Karrie Webb ended Annika Sorenstam’s Mizuno Classic winning streak at five, closing with a six-under 66 for a four-stroke victory over Kaori Higo in Japan’s lone LPGA Tour event at Mie.

Sorenstam shot a 70 to finish five strokes back at nine-under 207. The Swedish star also failed in her second attempt in a month to win an LPGA Tour event a record six times.

Sorenstam began the streak in 2001 at Musashigaoka and won four times at Seta. Last year, she became the first LPGA Tour player to win a tournament five straight times and matched the record she shares with Mickey Wright for victories in an event.

Webb won for the fifth time this season to match Lorena Ochoa for the LPGA Tour lead and push her career total to 35.

Brittany Lang, Aree Song and Jeong Eun Lee shot 70s to match Sorenstam at nine under, and Japanese stars Ai Miyazato (71) and Shinobu Moromizato (70) finished at eight under.

TENNIS

Clijsters returns with a championship

Former No. 1 Kim Clijsters won her comeback tournament before an adoring home crowd in Hasselt, Belgium, when she beat Kaia Kanepi, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4, to retain the Gaz de France title.

After sitting out 10 weeks because of a left wrist injury, Clijsters earned a jolt of confidence heading into the WTA Championships starting Tuesday in Madrid.

“I’m very happy to be part of it again ... despite all the injuries this year,” she said. “The Masters are one of my favorite tournaments.”

Clijsters, the winner of the Championships in 2002 and 2003, drew a pool with Maria Sharapova, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Elena Dementieva.

Kanepi became the first Estonian to play in a women’s final.

Clijsters won the 33rd title of her career and third this year.

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Nikolay Davydenko beat Dominik Hrbaty, 6-1, 6-2, 6-2, to win the Paris Masters for his fifth title of the season.

Fourth-seeded Davydenko dropped only one set in the tournament -- to Tommy Robredo in the semifinals -- in winning the 10th title of his career.

The first set took only 21 minutes, with Davydenko winning 92% of points on first serve and 80% on second serve.

“I don’t think I’ve played against a guy who played a better match than he did,” Hrbaty said. “I didn’t have any chances. It would be tough even for [Roger] Federer to beat him when he plays like this.”

Davydenko has won 67 matches this season, second to Federer’s 87.

Davydenko, Federer, Rafael Nadal, Ivan Ljubicic, Andy Roddick, Tommy Robredo, David Nalbandian and James Blake will now play in the Nov. 12-19 Masters Cup in Shanghai.

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Marion Bartoli routed Olga Poutchkova, 6-0, 6-0, in 41 minutes to win the Bell Challenge in Quebec City and close the year just as she started it, with a title.

Bartoli, who was seeded second, won the first WTA Tour title of her career in January in New Zealand.

Eighth-seeded Poutchkova suffered the first shutout in a WTA Tour final since January 1993 at Auckland.

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Top-seeded Ben Kohlloeffel of UCLA and Audra Cohen of Miami won singles titles at the Intercollegiate Tennis Assn. National Indoor Championships at the Racquet Club of Columbus in Ohio.

Kohlloeffel beat Ohio State’s Steven Moneke, 6-0, 6-4, in the men’s singles final. Cohen beat Fresno Pacific’s Jelena Pandzic, 5-7, 6-4, 6-2, in the women’s final.

Kohlloeffel became the third player to repeat as ITA National Indoor men’s singles champion, joining Arizona State’s Sargis Sargsian (1994-95) and Trinity’s (Texas) Erick Iskersky (1978-79).

The senior from Herne, Germany, also collected his third national title (he won the NCAA crown in May) and is only the fifth player to win at least three national collegiate singles titles, joining Brown and Yale’s Malcolm Chace (3), Miami’s Francisco Seguera (3), Georgia’s Mikael Pernfors (3) and Sargsian (4).

COLLEGE BASKETBALL

Bruins women win in exhibition finale

Noelle Quinn finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds and Lindsey Pluimer scored 17 points to help the UCLA women to a 79-73 victory over Team Concept, a group of former collegiate players, in the Bruins’ final exhibition game at Pauley Pavilion.