In the US Women’s Open, top-ranked player Nelly Korda missed the cut to advance to the next round.
Korda had an amazing start to the season and was confident of going and winning her seventh victory of the year. But any hopes of going much farther were dashed by an opening round of 10-over 80 and a par score of 70 in the second. She ended the round two strokes short of the eight-over threshold.
Following a terrible start to the competition, Korda’s birdies on the sixth, seventh, and eighth holes offered her hope that she might make the cut, but a bogey on the par-four ninth gave her too much to do. Using a par-four 18th, she finished the day with a bogey.
Bowing out, Korda said: “I knew it was going to be a tough day… Try to give it my all, you know that’s what I try to do with every round. I had nothing to lose, and that was my mentality – just kind of go for it.”
The end of an impressive streak
Korda’s failed cut ends an incredible run of consistency. This is the first time she has missed the cut since making 17 starts and winning the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship in June last year.
“When I made those three birdies in a row, I wanted to make the cut, obviously…I knew that I was kind of hovering around it, and I just couldn’t get anything going on the back,” Korda admitted.
With just one hole to play under par on Friday, the par-5 13th was Korda’s best opportunity to make the additional birdie she required. However, she missed her 16-foot putt for a 4 by inches.
“I wasn’t hitting my shots well off the tee… I really struggled off the tee this week. Just wasn’t getting it close. The majority of my holes I was saving pars. It was kind of tough out here trying to get into the cut line,” she added.
In her first two rounds, Korda only hit 44% of the fairways, and her off-the-tee performance was off by over a half stroke (.44). KPMG Performance Insights showed that she performed 1.25 lower than the rest of her 2024 season.
Source: CNN, GolfDigest