Creamer rises as Sorenstam fades

Someone new showed up for the showdown Friday at Mission Hills Country Club. Someone wearing a pink ribbon.

Lorena Ochoa still can take the LPGA’s No. 1 ranking out of Annika Sorenstam’s hands if she wins the $2-million Kraft Nabisco Championship, but Paula Creamer, known on the tour as the Pink Panther, might have something to say about that.

Sorenstam probably won’t. A four-over-par 76 in the second round dropped her 11 shots off the lead.

Meanwhile, up at the top, Creamer toured the Dinah Shore tournament course at Rancho Mirage in five-under 67, catching Ochoa for the second-round lead at four-under 140. Ochoa birdied two of her last four holes to rescue her round with a one-under 71.

First-round leader Shi Hyun Ahn shot a 73 and is tied for third with Suzann Pettersen, who had a three-under 69. They are only a shot behind Ochoa and Creamer. Se Ri Pak’s two-under 70 put her alone in fifth at 142.

Defending champion Karrie Webb, who started the day in a tie for third, faltered with a 77 and fell into a tie for 19th.

Ochoa started slowly, collecting a bogey and a double bogey in her first six holes before finally discovering her swing. She was not very pleased after she’d three-putted the 387-yard 15th, her sixth hole, and wound up with a double bogey. “You want to leave with a happy par,” she said.

Creamer left the course with five happy birdies and not a single bogey. Like Ochoa, Creamer is still searching for her first major title. But she’s only 20, and with Ochoa only 25, the LPGA’s future seems to be now.

Creamer missed four birdie putts of eight feet or less but said she was stressing patience.

“There’s a lot of golf left,” she said. “I keep telling myself, ‘You have to be able to finish it up, 36 holes.’ ”

Sorenstam almost missed having 36 holes to play on the weekend. She beat the cut line by only two shots and had no explanation for rounds of 75 and 76.

“I don’t have an idea, I really don’t,” she said. “It’s like sparkling water with no fizz. It happens. I just can’t get the spark to glow. I’m as puzzled as I can be.

“But it’s just a golf tournament. I’m trying, there’s nothing I can do. I’m not going to beat myself down.”

The golf course can handle that task with ease and just about every player is vulnerable. Mission Hills or Mission Impossible?

After two rounds, it’s clear that the only way to get ahead is to drive the ball, preferably a long way, so that you’ve got a short iron to the rock-hard greens. Long approach shots hit and bounce away.

Amy Alcott, who missed the cut, has played this course and this tournament for 33 consecutive years and says she has never seen the greens as firm.

“They favor a high-ball hitter,” she said. “And you’re not going to get it close very often hitting long irons.”

Ochoa said the greens probably would get even firmer the rest of the way, especially in the afternoon, because the tournament doesn’t want a repeat of her 62 in the first round last year. “So we don’t shoot so many under,” she said. “They are blaming it on me, because of last year, but it is not my fault.”

Creamer is starting her third year on the LPGA Tour. She has won twice but has only one top-10 finish in eight majors as a pro -- a tie for third in the 2005 LPGA Championship, which Sorenstam won.

Creamer spent the first two rounds playing alongside Sorenstam and watched her slide.

“It’s confidence, I think,” Creamer said. “Everybody has bad weeks and everybody has good weeks.”

It would be a particularly good week for Ochoa if she won because she would knock Sorenstam from her status as the preeminent player in women’s golf, a reign that began when Sorenstam won the first of five consecutive player-of-the-year awards in 2001.

Sorenstam has been ranked first for 13 months, since the LPGA’s ranking system began in February 2006.

Ochoa says she just wants to go out and play golf, and terms the quest for No. 1 a nonissue.

“Believe me, I’m not in a hurry,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for five years. Maybe two weeks, three weeks, four weeks more is not a problem ... and hopefully we’ll do it this week.”

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thomas.bonk@latimes.com