Ames sinks putt on No. 18 to defend Skins Game title

Stephen Ames chuckled about his mostly mediocre 18 holes of golf. He can laugh all the way to the bank.

With $650,000 at stake on No. 18, Ames coolly knocked his 7-foot birdie putt into the center of the cup Sunday at Indian Wells, Calif., to win the Skins Game. The only other hole he won was the first, a day earlier.

"That's the nature of the Skins Game," Ames said, his smile still as wide at it was when his rich putt dropped. "It's always been the way you play at the Skins Game.

"You kind of let the other guys beat themselves up and then you sneak in there when you need to."

Taking the title for the second year in a row, Ames finished with 9 skins and $675,000 of the $1 million purse.

Five-time champion Fred Couples, playing in the 25-year-old tournament for the 14th time, also won 9 skins, pocketing $325,000 to push his career earnings in the made-for-TV event to more than $4.2 million.

"Somebody's going to birdie the 18th hole, probably, and Stephen did it to win a big, big, big skin," Couples said. "If you win the right holes, you win money."

Couples won 3 skins and $75,000 on the first day with a bunker shot into the hole for an eagle on No. 4, then picked up $250,000 with a 5-footer for birdie on No. 10 to begin the second day.

Masters champion Zach Johnson and Brett Wetterich, making their Skins Game debuts, were shut out.

"I certainly enjoyed the experience and playing with these three guys," Johnson said. "It's a very unique event. It's nothing like I've ever been familiar with.

"But when all is said and done, I'm very disappointed. I came here to win some skins, and I didn't."

Said Wetterich: "I just feel bad for the charity I was trying to play for. I feel worse about that than anything else."

Each player donates 20 percent of his winnings to a charity of his choice, and Wetterich had picked Big Oak Ranch. Ames' donation will go to the Ames Foundation, and Couples' to California wildfires victims.

Ames, whose birdie on the opening hole of the tournament was worth $25,000, finally came up with another for the really big money 17 holes later. He stuck his 9-iron from 142 yards out close enough to the pin on No. 18 to give him a good chance, then watched the other three miss their considerably longer putts.

Johnson missed from 40 feet, Couples from 20, then Wetterich's 10-footer slid past the left edge of the hole to give Ames his chance.

He stroked the ball firmly and right on line, then, beaming, he accepted his playing partners' congratulations.

Realizing pars don't win skins, each of the foursome played aggressively, and frequently wound up in trouble because of it. Ames, a naturalized Canadian citizen from Trinidad & Tobago, didn't even finish No. 15 after his drive sailed into bushes to the left of the fairway. Couples and Johnson each birdied to tie the hole.

Ames' winning total was $590,000 in the tournament last year, when he clinched the title with a 3-footer for birdie worth $270,000. Couples finished second then, too, with $385,000.

The first six holes were worth $25,000 each, and Nos. 7-12 $50,000. The 13th through 17th carried a prize of $70,000 and No. 18 was worth $200,000.

In the Skins Game format, a player takes a skin by winning a hole. If the hole is tied by any of the players, the money carries over and all four remain in the hunt.

World Cup of Golf: Colin Montgomerie and Marc Warren gave Scotland its first victory in the World Cup of Golf, beating the United States' Boo Weekley and Heath Slocum with a par on the third hole of a playoff at Shenzhen, China.

The victory at Mission Hills Golf Club made up for Scotland's loss last year in Barbados on the first hole of a playoff with Germany's Bernhard Langer and Marcel Siem.

A par on the third extra hole was good enough for the Scots when Weekley missed a 15-foot putt par try after Montgomerie tapped in.

The Americans forced the playoff on the last hole of regulation hole in alternate-shot play when Slocum made a 5-foot birdie putt.

Australian Masters: Australia's Aaron Baddeley outlasted Sweden's Daniel Chopra to win the Australian Masters at Melbourne, Australia, saving par on the fourth hole of a playoff after hitting his tee shot into the trees. Baddeley chipped to 8 feet on the fourth extra hole -- the 18th -- and made the putt. Chopra, who made several clutch putts in regulation and in the playoff, dragged his par putt wide from a slightly shorter distance, giving the Australian the win.