End to Gerina Piller's LPGA tour winless streak in sight at CME Group Tour Championship
NAPLES, Fla. — Gerina Piller hears it all the time.
Why haven’t you won out here on the LPGA tour?
Well, she’s in position to give a resounding answer on Sunday in the CME Group Tour Championship at Tiburon Golf Club. In the 145th start of her career, Piller will begin Sunday’s final round two shots out of the lead after a 5-under-par 67 under overcast skies. At 11 under through 54 holes, she’ll be in the final group alongside co-leaders Cristie Kerr (66) and Ha Na Jang (69).
In addition to the $500,000 first-place check and a beautiful trophy she’d receive if she were to win, Piller wouldn’t have to hear people talking about her winless ways anymore.
“I’m trying to be the most patient person, but that’s all I hear. I mean, I hear it all the time,” Piller, 30, said. “That’s good and bad but I look at it this way – every year I keep getting better and better. My career in on a great trajectory. Kind of the only left is to win.”
So what’s holding her back? Those who are around the LPGA tour, including many of her colleagues, will tell you she’s one of the best ball strikers on tour. Makes plenty of birdies. Has tons of power. Played in two Solheim Cups.
“I just don’t think she realizes how good she is,” said world No. 3 Stacy Lewis. “I just think if she has someone who can put some confidence in her and make her believe in herself, she will win out here. Her abilities are just that good. She hits it as good and as far as anybody on tour. It’s just that belief in her putter that’s holding her back.”
Oh, yes, put a putter in her hand and …
“I hear that all the time, too. Oh, her putting, oh, her putting (is so bad),” said Piller, who finished second here in this tournament two years ago. “I don’t think I’m a bad putter. But I do have more confidence now.”
All because of one putt. Yes, to think, one putt, just one, could end up being the difference for Piller in the win column. Then again, it wasn’t your ordinary putt. Rewind to the Solheim Cup in September and press play when you get to the late stages of singles action.
That’s where you’ll find Piller facing a do-or-die position for the red, white and blue. She was on the 18th green against Germany’s Caroline Masson, on foreign soil and facing the longest 12-footer she’s ever looked at, let along imagine. Make it and Piller keeps the U.S. alive en route to a historic comeback. Miss it and Europe retains the Cup.
“When I was behind the putt, I was staring out into the distance as Caroline was lining up her putt and there was a huge scoreboard and all I saw was 13½ with blue around it and we’re not blue,” Piller said. “I’m a math major so I knew what that meant. If Caroline gets a ½-point, they get 14 and we lose.
“ … I just missed basically the same putt on 17. But I didn’t hit that putt very well so I just went back to basics before the last putt. I just made sure not to do anything extra because it meant more. You never do that any other time. So just trust that you prepared for that moment.”
Piller buried it. And about 20 minutes later, Paula Creamer closed out the 14½-13½ win for the U.S. Since that day, Piller has thought back to that putt over and over and over again.
“Why wouldn’t I?” she said, adding that she hears about that putt all the time now at the golf course, in airports, anywhere in her native town of Roswell, N.M., and anywhere in her hometown of Plano, Tex. “For sure it was great for my confidence. The whole week was. You’re on the biggest stage you will be on and to be successful on that stage gives you a lot of confidence.”
She also got a boost of confidence in Germany at the Solheim Cup when she heard that Lewis pleaded with captain Juli Inkster to be paired with Piller. Inkster granted the wish; the two won both of the team matches they played.
Piller showed a lot with that putt, that week. And now maybe the rest of her career. When asked why Piller hasn’t won yet, good friend and Solheim teammate Angela Stanford said she honestly didn’t know. Obviously, Stanford said, the talent is there. Maybe, though, it might be one thing – her personality.
“She’s one of the nicest people in the world,” Stanford said. “And the longer I’m out here, I’ve come to realize you have to have kind of this edge of not caring about other people sometimes. As bad as that sounds, in an individual sport, and I think it’s true. I think Gerina, in my opinion, has that conflict where she’s one of the nicest people in the world and it’s just hard for her to get in the mode of forgetting about everyone else.
“ … But to make the putt she made at Solheim, and to know she had to make it, she has to have something inside her. If you have a lack of confidence there’s no way she makes that putt. So whatever is inside her, I think she just tapped into it.”