RENO, Nev. – Michelle Wie isn't sure if she'll make a ninth attempt to become the first woman since Babe Zaharias in 1945 to make a cut on the PGA Tour.
On Friday, she failed for the eighth time to advance to weekend play when she shot an 80 that included a quintuple-bogey 9 to finish the second round of the Legends Reno Tahoe-Open at 9-over 153.
“If the opportunity comes again I feel like it would be a definite 'I'd think about it,” said Wie, who was making her first PGA appearance since January 2007 and shot a 1-over 73 on Thursday.
“I think if I played a couple (PGA events) in a row, it would be a different story,” she said. “It's just hard to play one and then one maybe a year later,” she said. “I think if I played eight in a row and I missed all eight, that would be a different story.”
While Wie was packing her bags, another Hawaiian-born player vaulted to the top of the leaderboard at the Montreux Golf & Country Club.
Parker McLachlin had 10 birdies – seven on the last 10 holes – to tie the course record with a 10-under 62 that gave him a four stroke lead over 1987 Masters winner Larry Mize and three others.
He summed up in one word the stellar wedge play that left him with seven birdie attempts within 7 feet, two of those from 2 feet and one from 4 inches.
“Luck,” said the 29-year-old UCLA product who has five top 25 PGA finishes this year and ranks 98th on the tour money list.
“Missing greens, I've always had to find a way to get up and down. So my wedge game has always been pretty good. And if you put a little bit of luck in there, you hole out a few shots,” he said.
Wie could have used a bit of that luck. She had two bogeys and one birdie through her first nine holes on Friday and was within striking distance of a cut line that was hovering around even par with several golfers still on the 7,472-yard mountain course.
But she had a double bogey on her 13th hole of the day after she hit her second shot over the green into heavy rough on the 518-yard, par-5 No. 4.
With a difficult downhill lie, her chip came up short, still in the rough. Her next pitch rolled over the green into the rough again before she finally chipped onto the green and two putted.
The quintuple-bogey 9 came four holes later on the 464-yard, par-4 eighth, when she had to take two penalty strokes.
Her first tee shot ended up with an unplayable lie in the trees and the second one went left into a waste area with sage brush and pine trees, where she had to take another drop and needed four more shots to reach the green. She finished with a birdie on the 626-yard, par-5 ninth.
“I feel my game is a lot better,” Wie said. “Obviously the score doesn't show it, but I know what I need to work on. I gave it my best today and I felt like I did a lot of good things and hopefully that outshines the ones I made mistakes on.”
McLachlin missed a four-foot birdie attempt on the par-4 18th that would have broken the course record Bill Glasson set in 2005 and Joe Ogilvie matched in 2006.
“Nothing really crazy. It was just pretty solid,” McLachlin said about his round that left him at 130 after two days of play.
“Everything went pretty smoothly out there. I hit a lot of fairways, lots of greens and made a bunch of 10-footers. I mean, just kind of the way you like to draw it up,” he said.
McLachlin's previous best on tour was a 65, though he said he once had a 59 at the course he represents in Hawaii, where he was born and grew up.
“I didn't know what the course record was but I caught myself thinking about 59 at No. 14. I had like about a 10-footer,” said McLachlin, who had birdied six of the previous seven holes. “I thought 'If I birdie the last five holes I can shoot 59.' And that's just the worst thing to think. So I made par there.”
Mize, who turns 50 in September and hasn't won on tour since 1993, followed an opening round 68 with a 66 in windier afternoon conditions to get to 10-under 134 – the first time in three years he's opened a tourney with two rounds in the 60s. He was in a four-way tie for second with Australian Nick Flanagan, who shot a 65 on Friday, and John Merrick and England's Brian Davis, who both shot consecutive 67s.
“It was tricky out there sometimes with the wind so to get out of there with a 66, I'm pleased,” Mize said. “I'm trying to get ready for the Senior Tour, so I'm trying to play well out here.”
