PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla.\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Jupiter Links GC may have lost the opening match of the TGL Finals Monday night,\u00a0but they gained a big asset heading into Tuesday\u2019s finale.<\/p>\n
Woods, who\u00a0hasn\u2019t\u00a0played on the PGA Tour since The Open Championship in July 2024\u00a0but did play TGL\u00a0in its inaugural season,\u00a0will be competing for the first time since he had a back surgery in October 2025. Woods is constantly asked about his return to play (as he continues to be on the sidelines for Jupiter Links as its coach), but has been noncommittal.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes I have good days, sometimes I have bad days. Disk replacement is not a lot\u00a0of\u00a0fun,\u201d Woods said after the semifinal. \u201cI’ve\u00a0had a lot of procedures prior to that, so the body\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0quite heal like it was when I was 24.\u00a0Doesn’t\u00a0quite bounce back. So,\u00a0I have good days when I can\u00a0pretty much do\u00a0anything, and other days where\u00a0it’s\u00a0hard to just move around.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
After Jupiter Links fell to Los Angeles Golf Club 6-5 in Match 1 of the best-of-three championship, though, Woods is going to get off the sidelines and into the arena.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The big cat is on the prowl once again.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jupiter Links had a tremendous chance to win the opener Monday night at the SoFi\u00a0Centre, but Kevin Kisner\u00a0had a poor effort on the\u00a0closing par-5 15th, mishitting his fairway wood approach just 150 yards. Sahith\u00a0Theegala, who had struggled\u00a0mightily\u00a0through the evening, managed to stay steady enough in the closing hole to win two points \u2014 with the hammer thrown \u2014 and push Los Angeles from a one-point deficit to a one-point victory.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThese guys had my back all night, and\u00a0they’ve\u00a0had my back the last two years, and I know\u00a0they’ll\u00a0continue to have my back.\u00a0It’s\u00a0just a great feeling knowing that they trust me,\u201d\u00a0Theegala\u00a0said.\u00a0\u201cIt was a decision to hit driver or less, but honestly, when it came down to the moment, I felt good about driver, and I\u00a0don’t\u00a0know why I felt good about driver\u00a0(off the tee on 15).\u00a0But again, these guys trusted me and\u00a0(my caddie)\u00a0trusted me, so just went ahead and tried to execute.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201c(Kisner)\u00a0got a little unlucky there on the last hole, but it was awesome to be able to put together two good shots there when the match was on the line.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The match was a bit of a pillow fight to begin, with both teams struggling on the greens early. But Justin Rose hit the shot of the match on No. 8, pitching in from 35 feet to push Los Angeles into a 2-2 tie. Jupiter Links threw the hammer on No. 9,\u00a0but Los Angeles declined. They trailed 3-2 heading into singles.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was 3-3 after No. 10 after Max Homa missed yet another short putt for Jupiter Links.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u00a0was\u00a0probably just\u00a0one of those nights. The short ones are tricky,\u201d Homa said. \u201cYou get certain pins, especially around that bunker, that have a decent amount of break, and where you leave it is\u00a0pretty paramount.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just have those spots that\u00a0it’s\u00a0going to be awkward. We had two horseshoes tonight.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was tied 4-4 through 12 holes, with\u00a0Theegala\u00a0hitting his second shot of the match into the penalty area on the par 3. Homa then won the next hole, No. 13, to put Jupiter Links up by one until Kisner\u2019s final-hole collapse.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel pretty\u00a0(bad)\u00a0to be honest with you after losing the last hole,\u201d Kisner said. \u201cI thought I hit a perfect chip\u00a0(on 15),\u00a0didn’t\u00a0go in, and sucks to be on the\u00a0end of (a loss). A\u00a0couple\u00a0weeks\u00a0ago, we had the last hole to win the match for all of us, and now losing that just feels terrible.\u00a0It’s\u00a0a great team. I enjoy it. I had so much fun competing and\u00a0can’t\u00a0wait to try to beat them tomorrow.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Tuesday is set to be a busy day for both teams. If Jupiter Links manages to win Match 2, then they will turn around and go out\u00a0immediately\u00a0for Match 3 \u2014 the deciding match for the SoFi Cup.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
While Jupiter Links is down, they will be up a player on Tuesday \u2014 and not just any addition. The 15-time major winner himself is back. Woods has been chipping and putting through the TGL season, but we\u2019ve yet to see him make full swings. It\u00a0won\u2019t, of course, be a fiery and epic return with walking up hills and battling the elements. But\u00a0he will be back in a\u00a0competitive environment and, well, you\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0count out Tiger Woods when it comes time to get a big win.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla.\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Jupiter Links GC may have lost the opening match of the TGL Finals Monday night,\u00a0but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556957,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":["post-556956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556956"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556956\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}