Leona Maguire is chasing a low final round and her second LPGA Tour title today after a 5-under 66 and six birdies at the Dana Open in Ohio to leave her just three shots behind the leader.
The Co Cavan star made birdies on the 1st, 3rd, 6th and 9th, birdies on the 16th and 17th, her only bogey of the day on the 11th, and two more in regulation. I just missed the green.
The world number 15 at 11-under is tied for fourth and tied for seventh behind Lucy Lee, whose 67-under beat Germany’s Caroline Masson and USA’s Lexi Thompson’s 65-under at 14-under. .
“Yeah, we got off to a really good start,” said Maguire. He is 13th in the Race to CME Globe standings, and in his 18 appearances at the LPGA he has one win, five Top 10s and $1,169,531. “It was good that he birdied three of his first five holes. He gave himself a lot of chances and hit a lot of greens. It was the best result I’ve ever had, and I’m very happy with it.”
“I wish I could have birdied 18, but I didn’t get there. Yeah, 16, 17 and 18 are three really good chances to finish. At least I got two of the three. There are some good things.Momentum heading into tomorrow.”
Covering the top 10 in just four shots, she is New Zealand’s Lydia Ko (64), South Korea’s Seyung Kim (65), Australia’s Hannah Green (66), China’s Xu Ling (66) and Luoning Ying. (68), Nasa Hataoka (67) from Japan
“Yeah, there are really a lot of leaderboards out there.
“The weather isn’t supposed to be so good tomorrow so we’ll see how it goes. But it’s looking good for tomorrow and we’re just going to try another low weather record.”
“Hopefully it’s not as rainy as it was last Sunday. But maybe it’s a bit difficult to get birdies in the rain, so try to get as many birdies as you can today. ”
Maguire is refreshing after spending the last two weeks at his home in Cavan after a busy summer in Europe.
“I really enjoyed my time at home,” she said. “It was nice to be back in Europe for six, seven, or even weeks, and then go home for two weeks to reset, recharge, and get excited for the second half of the season.
“I think it’s easy to get frustrated and lose patience at this point in the season, so my time at home comes out with a little fresher perspective and I’m enjoying being here.”
