1990 Florida Open - Palm Beach Polo & CC

Dudley Hart

Hard-luck Hart Takes Florida Open In Playoff

^{Miami Herald
July 30, 1990}

Dudley Hart didn't win a tournament the past four years as a golfer for the University of Florida. He finished second and third enough times to begin reminding himself of the PGA Tour's tough-luck boy Payne Stewart.

So when he showed up at Palm Beach Polo and Country Club Sunday for the final round of the $65,000 Cadillac Florida Open, Hart didn't know what to expect. Hart, who began the day two strokes behind leaders Jay Townsend and Dennis Postlewait, thought he had a shot to win his first tournament as a professional. But a bogey at No. 5 left him five shots back and Hart prepared for another top-five finish.

Then Hart's putter came to life and he birdied six of the final 10 holes to tie Townsend at 12-uner-par 276 at the end of regulation on the ther-72, 7,050-yard course. And when Townsend missed a nine-footer for par on the first playoff hole, Hart became the surprise owner of the $10,663 winner's check.

"You keep thinking about when a victory is going to come," said Hart, 21, who lives in Fort Lauderdale and attended Miami's Curley High. "But I came here to win, not just play decent in my first pro tournament."

That's why he was angry at himself when he walked to the ninth tee Sunday trailing Townsend by five. Hart didn't feel in control of his game. At the eighth hole, he knocked a 5-iron left of the green and forced himself to sink an eight-footer for par to simply keep from falling further off the pace.

"I was really struggling," said Hart, who was an NCAA All-American after finishing 12th in last year's NCAA Championships. "I didn't know where I was hitting it. I just didn't have it."

It had become clear to him that Townsend and Postlewait, who took turns holding the lead, weren't going to retreat. That thinking turned out to be sound. Townsend ended up with a round of 69 and didn't make bogey until the playoff hole when he pulled an 8-iron and had to chip from a lie up against the greenside rough. Postlewait was playing steadily in a round of 72, which would give him third.

So Hart did the only thing he could in such a gloomy situation. He started swinging for flagsticks.

He birdied the ninth hole after knocking a wedge to 20 feet. Then he chipped to three feet at the par-five 11th and calmly stroked that putt in for birdie.

The key to his charge came at the par-three 13th, where he had a 228-yard shot into the wind. He pulled a 1-iron from his bag, then reconsidered. Hart settled on a 3-wood and hit it to 10 feet. When he made that birdied and trailed by only two, Hart realized he was back in the running.

"It wasn't all that easy anymore," he said. "You feel like you're one of the leaders, which is a lot different than being five back. But you know what, I'd rather be in that position. There's no guarantee you're going to make all those birdies."

It took three more to get Hart even with Townsend. He knocked a wedge to 20 feet and made the putt at No. 16. At the par-five 17th, he hit his third shot from a greenside bunker to four feet for another birdie. Then on the final hole, he made birdie from six feet after a purely stroked 8-iron. "He made an awful lot of putts," said Townsend, who needed a 12-footer for par at the final hole to make the playoff. "When you make putts like that, you're going to beat a guy who is just hitting greens and making pars."