LANCASTER, Pa. — One shot put two-time main champion Minjee Lee proper within the combine Saturday within the U.S. Girls’s Open, and she or he surged her strategy to a 4-under 66 that gave her a share of the lead with Stanford alum Andrea Lee and Wichanee Meechai.
Andrea Lee overcame a couple of errors early that left her three photographs behind at one level. She was bogey-free on the harder again 9 for a 67. Meechai, the one participant to succeed in 6 underneath par at any level this week, twice saved par on the closing three holes for a 69.
They had been at 5-under 205.
Nelly Korda and different large stars in ladies’s golf had been lengthy gone from Lancaster Nation Membership. Left behind was an incredible give-and-take amongst 5 gamers who remained underneath par.
Minjee Lee was 4 photographs behind and going nowhere till she hit her strategy to 2 toes for eagle on the par-5 seventh gap. Equally spectacular was her tee shot to a scary entrance left pin on the infamous par-3 twelfth gap to three toes for birdie.
Her 66 matched the low rating of the match. Former AIG Girls’s Open champion Hinako Shibuno had seven birdies Saturday for a 66 that left her solely two photographs behind.
The opposite participant underneath par was former U.S. Girls’s Open champion Yuka Saso. She was inside one shot of the lead till dropping two photographs over the ultimate 4 holes. It might need been worse apart from a daring flop shot over a bunker to a good pin on the seventeenth that arrange a impossible par save. Saso shot 69.
Everybody else was over par, and Lancaster Nation Membership isn’t the monitor that enables for large expenses. It’s extra hold on for pricey life, significantly in a last spherical at a U.S. Open.
Saturday was completely different, and Minjee Lee felt that is likely to be the case.
“It’s shifting day, and I assumed there can be fairly a couple of alternatives for birdies,” she mentioned. “Understanding the USGA, they put a few the tees up. I assumed the setup was nice for a Saturday. I’m actually trying ahead to tomorrow.”
She would know what to anticipate having received her second main on the U.S. Girls’s Open two years in the past at Pine Needles when she received by 4 photographs.
Now it’s crowded on the high.
Meechai — she goes by “Jan” when enjoying in America — is essentially the most unlikely contender. Her solely victory in a match acknowledged by the ladies’s world rating was on the Taiwan LPGA 9 years in the past. She is No. 158 on the planet rating.
She regarded impervious to the nerves of the largest occasion in ladies’s golf, even after her group (with Andrea Lee) was given a warning for gradual play.
Andrea Lee, who began two photographs behind, opened with a 25-foot birdie putt. Meechai adopted her in from simply exterior 20 toes. The 31-year-old Thai additionally drilled an iron onto the inexperienced on the seventh to arrange a two-putt birdie that put her at 6 underneath.
However she dropped two photographs on the again 9, solely to ship a magnificence with an 8-iron on the fifteenth, simply sufficient right-to-left motion on her shot that it rode the slope of the inexperienced to three toes that put her within the lead.
That solely lasted lengthy sufficient for Minjee Lee to gap an 18-foot birdie putt on the brief par-4 sixteenth, after laying again off the tee with a 5-iron. After which Andrea Lee got here by means of on the sixteenth with a shot into 3 toes to affix them.
At stake is a $2.4 million payoff to the winner, by far the most important in ladies’s golf. Lancaster has had big galleries all week, identical to in 2015, and the stage may really feel even greater.
Three of the contenders underneath par are former main champions. Andrea Lee was a adorned beginner who has one LPGA victory. Meechai is likely to be essentially the most trustworthy about her possibilities.
She is staying in a home by herself — it was rented by a Thai participant who didn’t qualify — and thought the home is likely to be haunted. “If they’ve a ghost in the home, I believe the ghost likes me,” she mentioned Friday.
After which she instructed of waking up at 3 a.m. forward her third spherical. She mentioned she had been dreaming of the U.S. Girls’s Open.
“I believe it’s in my thoughts, very deep in there,” she mentioned. “I don’t suppose I can eliminate it. I’m making an attempt to get together with it. I hope it really works.”
Saturday was nonetheless robust sufficient for 15-year-old Asterisk Talley, the youngest participant within the discipline and a highschool freshman enjoying within the third-to-last group. She shot 78 to fall out of competition, going from 5 photographs behind to 14 photographs out of the lead.