Birdie

On January 5, 2007 BIRDIE COVINGTON. On Thursday friends may call at VAUGHN C. GREENE FUNERAL SERVICES (RANDALLSTOWN), 8728 Liberty Road from 4:00-8:00 p.m. On Friday, Mrs. Covington will lie in state at Christian Unity Temple Church, 399 Groveland Avenue, where the family will receive friends from 10:00-10:30 a.m. with services to follow. Inquiries to 410-655-0015.

Adrian Druzgala finally struck gold, as he charged through the back nine to a dramatic, one-stroke victory in the 32nd annual Maryland Amateur Stroke Play championship yesterday.At the start of the hot, humid final round at Mount Pleasant Golf Course, there were eight players within four shots of leader Bart DeLuca, but when it was over, Druzgala's 72 led the pack, producing a 54-hole total of 215.In striking a blow for the middle-aged, Druzgala, 47, who had been thwarted with three seconds among a bunch of top-10 finishes in this event over the last dozen years, had to turn back bids by two talented teen-agers.

MITCHELLVILLE -- Larry Ringer and David Oakley, both backed by U.S. Senior Open experience, earned the two available places in yesterday's sectional qualifying for the 20th annual championship.Ringer, 54, head professional at the Country Club of Woodmore, toured his home course in 4-under-par 68, and Oakley, 54, from Orlando, Fla., shot 70. The two were the only ones among 60 starters to break par over the Prince George's County course. Sheldon Kalish, from Baltimore, won the playoff for first alternate, beating Dick Blackburn, of Alexandria, Va., with a par on the second extra hole.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- By the time she reached her ball on the 18th green at DuPont Country Club yesterday, Juli Inkster was playing a different game than anyone else in the McDonald's LPGA Championship.The 20-footer she was facing for birdie on the par-4 finishing hole seemed almost like a tap-in to Inkster. "It was like I was putting into a bucket," she said later. "I just knew it was going to go in."If the last putt put an exclamation point on Inkster's four-shot victory and four-round total of 16-under-par 268, the last three holes made a statement about the kind of player the 39-year-old mother of two has become.

Kevin Moylan, the last man off the course, posted a 2-under-par 69 and tied Bart DeLuca for the first-round lead in the 32nd annual Maryland Amateur Stroke Play championship yesterday at Mount Pleasant Golf Course.Earlier, it had looked like a youth movement at the top, as DeLuca, 18, who just finished a Dean's List freshman year at Wake Forest, was followed by Steve Colnitis, 16, and a St. Paul's junior. They had been the only ones in a 150-player field to break par of 36-35 before Moylan joined them.

Mark Evenson from Ellicott City and Joey Chuasiriporn from Timonium were among nine players advancing out of yesterday's U.S. Open local qualifying round at Eagle's Nest.Evenson, an assistant pro at the Suburban Club, shot 3-under-par 69, and Chuasiriporn, an amateur from Hunt Valley Golf Club, shot a 2-under 70. The medal was shared by Eric Egloff of Rockville and Bryan Jackson of Portsmouth, Va., who both shot 68s.Just making the 7: 39 a.m. tee time was an accomplishment for Chuasiriporn.

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Nobody has yet to mention anything to Davis Love about a jinx here at Augusta National, a second-place syndrome. Not with Greg Norman still coming close and falling short yesterday at the 63rd Masters.But Norman didn't finish second to Jose Maria Olazabal.Love did, marking the second time in the last four years that the former PGA champion has found himself in that position. It's a spot Love would have loved earlier in his career, but not anymore.After congratulating Olazabal, Love made it clear he was crushed.

WEST POINT, Miss. -- She was the first player to win three straight U.S. Amateur championships, doing it when Tiger Woods was merely a 5-year-old phenom. As a pro, Juli Inkster has won three majors and 16 other LPGA Tour events, making her a legitimate candidate for the Hall of Fame.There is only one void on her impressive resume, and it could be eliminated today after the final round of the 54th U.S. Women's Open here at Old Waverly.With birdies on the first two holes yesterday, Inkster broke away from second-round co-leader Lorie Kane of Canada and then started distancing herself from the rest of the field.

Captions for two Ryder Cup photos in yesterday's editions, both referring to an 18th-hole putt by American golfer Davis Love, appeared to contradict one another.In fact, the caption on Page 1A referred to a morning round Friday, when Love's birdie effort failed. The caption on Page 1C was from the afternoon round, when his birdie putt dropped.

BROOKLINE, Mass. -- When the golf cart carrying Ben Crenshaw stopped at the crest of a hill leading up to the 12th green at The Country Club yesterday morning, the U.S. Ryder Cup captain jumped out and spotted an old friend."

Senior Players Championship Irwin, Kite, Morgan, Thorpe commit to Constellation The Constellation Energy Senior Players Championship gained commitments Tuesday from four of the over-50 circuit's biggest stars. Champions Tour career wins leader Hale Irwin, former U.S. Open champion Tom Kite, 25-time Champions Tour winner Gil Morgan and former Morgan State running back Jim Thorpe will compete in this year's event, tournament officials announced. The Constellation will be played Sept. 28-Oct.

CHASKA, Minn. - - Padraig Harrington could sense it in the thick, humid air above Hazeltine National. So could Ernie Els. The fans want Tiger Woods to win the PGA Championship. But they also long for drama. "Everybody wants to see a battle," Harrington said. "It's part of our human nature to support the underdog." A reporter asked Els whether he believed the galleries want to see him - or anyone, for that matter - duel Woods down the stretch today and threaten his two-shot lead. "I could definitely feel that," Els said.

BETHESDA - -There were, it would seem, two appropriate and intriguing names that could sit atop the AT&T National leader board at the end of yesterday's first round. With no disrespect intended, that short list did not include D.A. Points or Bryce Molder or Daniel Chopra - fine players all, but something of a who's who of "Who?" So by noon, when one of those names popped up, Bethesda was buzzing because Anthony Kim, who won this tournament a year ago, shot an 8-under-par 62 to set the course record at Congressional Country Club's immaculate Blue Course.

Anna Nordqvist might be a rookie on the LPGA tour, but she's already showing a flair for the dramatic and a touch of the clutch. For the second straight day, the 22-year-old Swede sank a long birdie putt on her final hole. For the second straight day, it was the margin at the top of the leader board in the McDonald's LPGA Championship. After waiting out a two-hour, 20-minute rain delay, and with darkness approaching at Bulle Rock in Havre de Grace, Nordqvist rolled in a 20-foot putt on the 15th hole to wrestle the lead from Lindsey Wright.

Cycling Menchov tumbles, gets up to win Giro; Armstrong 12th Denis Menchov won the Giro d'Italia despite falling in the final half-mile. The Russian lost control on rain-slicked cobblestones and slid for about 10 yards. He got right back up, ran ahead to his bike but then opted to take a spare bike provided by his team car. Menchov entered the final stage - an 8.95-mile individual time trial in Rome - with a 20-second lead on Danilo Di Luca and was comfortably ahead of the Italian at the final checkpoint before he fell.

Daly, who coached U.S., Pistons, is dead nba Chuck Daly, who coached the Dream Team to the Olympic gold medal in 1992 after winning back-to-back NBA championships with the Detroit Pistons, died Saturday morning in Jupiter, Fla., with his family by his side. He was 78. The Pistons announced in March that the Hall of Fame coach was being treated for pancreatic cancer. Daly was renowned for creating harmony out of diverse personalities at all levels of the game, whether they were Ivy Leaguers at Pennsylvania, Dream Teamers Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley, or Pistons as dissimilar as Dennis Rodman and Joe Dumars.

AUGUSTA, Ga. -The fans wanted to witness history, and Chad Campbell strived to supply it. Not long after the soft-spoken Texan set a Masters record by making birdies on his first five holes, the patrons shouted words of encouragement. "63!" "One more!" "Get to 10!" Campbell's birdie on No. 16 got him to 9-under par, but he retreated with bogeys on 17 and 18 for a still-sterling 65 that left him wanting more. "Leaves you with a sour taste in your mouth," he said after falling two strokes shy of the course-record 63 - but five better than Tiger Woods.

Mickelson pulls off late rally at Riviera golf On the verge of blowing the biggest lead of his career, Phil Mickelson turned his fortunes around in the final hour at Riviera with back-to-back birdies that carried him to a one-shot victory yesterday in the Northern Trust Open in Los Angeles. Mickelson went from a four-shot lead at the start of the final round to a two-shot deficit with three holes to play. But he hit a 9-iron to 5 feet for birdie on the 16th, holed a 6-foot birdie on the 17th and saved par with a 6-foot putt on the final hole.

Schilling: Make '03 list of failed drug tests public baseball A day after Alex Rodriguez was linked to steroids, another All-Star offered this suggestion: Make public the entire list of players who failed drug tests. "I'd be all for the 104 positives being named, and the game moving on if that is at all possible," former Boston Red Sox ace Curt Schilling wrote on his blog yesterday. Rodriguez joined Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens on an ever-growing list of stars tainted by the Steroid Era scandal.

After a weekend of optimal scoring conditions, Seon Hwa Lee made one birdie on the back nine in the final round. That was enough. Lee birdied the final hole for a one-stroke victory over Jane Park and Meena Lee yesterday in the LPGA Tour's NW Arkansas Championship in Rogers. Seon Hwa Lee closed with a 4-under-par 68 to finish at 15-under 201. Meena Lee (70) led by a stroke before coming up short of the green on the par-3 17th. Her chip was long, and she missed from about 10 feet for a bogey.