Final Round

IT WASN'T HARD to identify with Jason Gore, the walking human interest story who stepped to the first tee at Pinehurst yesterday with a chance to deliver one of the great long-shot victories in the history of the U.S. Open. It was even easier to identify with him a few hours later, when he double-bogeyed the 18th hole to finish with a final round of 84 ... a mile or so behind New Zealand's Michael Campbell, who actually did deliver one of the great long-shot victories in Open history. Gore was the guy with the perpetual smile who found himself in the highly unlikely position of being paired with defending champion and three-round leader Retief Goosen in the last group yesterday.

SATURDAY'S TELEVISION HIGHLIGHTS X Games Foz do Iguacu ESPN11 a.m. MLB Dodgers@Orioles, Game 1 MASN1 Detroit@Angels 453 Washington@Mets 53 Dodgers@Orioles, Game 2 MASN, 137 St. Louis@Philadelphia MLB7 NBA play. First Round: Boston@New York 2, 73:30 First Round: Golden State@Denver ESPN5:30 First Round: Chicago@Brooklyn ESPN8 First Round: Memphis@Clippers ESPN10:30 Basketball Nike Hoop Summit ESPN27 Boxing Fight Night: T. Fury vs. S. Cunningham 11, 44 Saul Alvarez vs. Austin Trout SHOW10 PGA RBC Heritage, Third Round 13, 93 Champions Greater Gwinnett, 2nd Rd. GOLF3 LPGA LOTTE Championship, Final Round GOLF6:30 NHL Florida@New Jersey NHL1 Washington@Montreal CSN7 Horses Coolmore Lexington Stakes MASN4:30 M. lax. Bucknell@Colgate CBSSNNoon Villanova@Notre Dame ESPNU2 Navy@Johns Hopkins ESPNU4 M. soccer EPL: Fulham vs Arsenal ESPN29:55 a.m. EPL: Sunderland vs Everton FOXSOC10 a.m. Tennis Fed Cup: U.S. vs. Sweden TENNIS2, 4 RADIO HIGHLIGHTS MLB Washington@Mets 1500 AM3 Dodgers@Orioles 1090 AM7

Glen Barrett, head professional at Glenn Dale Golf Club, knocked three strokes off par in his final three holes and vaulted into the lead after two rounds of the 73rd annual Maryland Open tournament at Crofton Country Club yesterday.The 3-under-par 69 left him at 140, three strokes ahead of his closest pursuer heading into this morning's final round. Webb Heintzelman had the day's low round, a 68, and moved into second at 143.Amateur Del Ponchock, the defending champion, and Buddy Sass each shot 70 and were at 144, followed by first-day leader John McNaney, 145.With the field cut to the low 40 and ties, 49 players at 153 will play today, with starting times between 7:30 and 10:34 a.m.Barrett called his round the opposite of his opening 71 when he reached nine greens in regulation and got up-and-down from all over.

At Bikal, after last week's Tribal Council, Michael is glad that he survived. Corinne gloats about getting to keep "her gay" which is gone beyond annoying and getting downright offensive. Phillip takes Corinne and Dawn aside and tells them about how he 'threw' the challenge so they had to go to Tribal Council. They believe it as much as Cochran did last week, which is to say, not at all.   Dawn is anxious about the upcoming merge, since this is when her game fell apart last time.

Farmingdale, N.Y. - -Could there have been a more enticing preview for what will come today? Did NBC have a hand in this? Moments before darkness closed the curtains Sunday at the 109th U.S. Open, Tiger Woods crept onto the first page of the leader board. Meanwhile, Ricky Barnes, seemingly in position to win his first anything since 2002, took on the gait of a man who couldn't swallow. Was a golf ball lodged in his throat? Barnes bogeyed the first hole of his final round and snap-hooked his drive on the second.

CASTLE ROCK, Colo. -- Ian Baker-Finch appears all but certain of reaching the final round of The International -- if the weather allows the final round to be reached.For the second time in as many days, thunderstorms yesterday caused an overnight delay in play.Seventy-two men -- including PGA champion John Daly -- still were on the course when darkness fell on the Castle Pines Golf Club and extended second-round play into today. They were scheduled to return at 7 a.m. to complete the second round -- complete with the probable playoff for the final few qualifying spots -- before third-round play later in the day.That timetable, of course, is subject to change by the weather.

HAGERSTOWN -- Jack Skilling, whose history of poor first-round scores usually had eliminated him from title contention, came into this year's Maryland Open determined to have a good first round, then get into position to be a contender the second day.After meeting those two goals with rounds of 70 and 67 for 3-under-par 137, Skilling, head professional at the White Flint Golf Center in Rockville, finds himself in an unfamiliar Open position as the leader...

Warren Guernsey of Cobleskill, N.Y., has been bowling well enough lately to consider returning to the Professional Bowlers Association Tour full time. His performance yesterday in the Lipton Brisk PBA East Coast Tournament did nothing to change that notion. Guernsey, 28, finished plus-359 in eight games at Shake and Bake Bowl in West Baltimore to lead the tournament and qualify for today's finals. Eleven others in the 78-man field, including Danny Wiseman of Baltimore and Tim Criss of Bel Air, also advanced.

Keith Unikel, a University of Maryland junior, came from five shots back with a closing 4-under-par 68, lifting him to a 54-hole total of 217 and a one-stroke victory in the 77th annual Maryland Open at Crofton Country Club yesterday.The winner had opened 75-74 and finished about an hour ahead of the last groups. Down the stretch, Mark Evenson and second-round leader Dennis Winters had their chances, but could not get the one birdie that would have given either, or both, a share of the lead.

Followed by a gallery of 20, professional golfers Wayne DeFrancesco of Columbia and Gary Mankulish of Rockville took the lead after the second round in the 84th Maryland Open Championship yesterday at Woodholme Country Club in Pikesville. DeFrancesco, a teaching professional at Woodholme, finished the day with 70 on the par-71 course to bring his total coming into today's final round to 141. He birdied the ninth hole but otherwise shot par with a strong short game. DeFrancesco, who won the event in 1994 and 1995 and tied for fifth last year, was tied for third after the first round.

On any given weekend, you'll see some gymnastics late at night at downtown Baltimore's Power Plant Live. The over-intoxicated kind. The running from someone yucky who's hitting on you kind. But this weekend, it was the real kind as the Ravens cheerleaders surprised the late-night bar crowd with a performance. It was actually a flash mob -- planned in complete surprise -- with one cheerleader after another joining the show as folks finally figured out what was happening.

COLLEGE PARK — Madison Brengle defeated Ellicott City native Beatrice Capra, 7-6 (4), 6-7, 6-1, in final-round qualifying Monday at the Citi Open. Rain delayed the match for nearly two hours midway through the first set. Capra burst onto the pro tennis scene with her run to the third round of the U.S. Open last September but has had a rough time since. "Right after the U.S. Open, I got injured and then in the beginning of this year I got really sick and couldn't play for two months.

Players spent the week at the AT&T National worrying over the course's difficulty. Then came Saturday. Seven players tied or broke the course record, defying Aronimink Golf Club's inherent difficulty. The most stunning round came from Nick Watney, who shot an 8-under-par 27 on the back nine on his way to a course-record 62 that earned him a spot in today's final group with Rickie Fowler and K.J. Choi. After Choi made a 26-foot putt on No. 18 for the day's 280th birdie, tournament officials turned their attention to a firmer setup today that might rein in the scoring.

Catonsville High graduate and McDaniel College golfer Greg Bowman closed the NCAA Division III golf championships in Greensboro, N.C. with a final round of 77. The junior, who played as an individual for the final 36 holes, finished up his 72 holes on the East Course of the Grandover Resort on Friday with a total of 301 (13 over par), recording the lowest individual 72-hole score of any Green Terror golfer and any Centennial Conference golfer at the championship. In the first round Bowman fired a career-low round of 70 and followed that with with an even-par 72 to post a 142 and make the cut Bowman's score tied for 36th place overall of the 81 players who made the cut after a tournament that started with 205 golfers.

SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. - Two years ago, Fred Funk played the final round of the PGA Championship with Tiger Woods, pumping his fists and making enough shots to stay in contention until the back nine before finishing tied for fourth. It was Funk's best finish ever in a major. The former Maryland golf coach hoped to improve on that performance going into the final round of the 104th U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club. After starting the round three shots behind Retief Goosen, a string of early bogeys and a disheartening double bogey took Funk out of contention quickly.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Tiger Woods will be looking to take another place in the record books in the 82nd PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club. Bob May and Scott Dunlap will be looking to become the answer to a trivia question. Who was the relative unknown who stopped Woods in his pursuit of his third straight major championship and denied Woods his spot next to the legendary Ben Hogan as the only players to have won three majors in the same season? With a 2-under-par 70 yesterday, Woods stopped himself from running away as he did during his 15-stroke victory in this year's U.S. Open at Pebble Beach and again during his eight-stroke win in last month's British Open at St. Andrews.