Australian rookie Grace Kim won the LOTTE Championship on Saturday at breezy Hoakalei Country Club for her first LPGA Tour title, beating Yu Liu and Yu Jin Sung with a birdie on the first hole of a playoff.
While Liu and Sung scrambled after hitting their second shots to the left of the green on the par-5 18th, the 22-year-old Kim went over the water to the right, then chipped to 8 feet to set up her birdie.
“I definitely wanted to have a good go at it knowing that the green wasn’t the best, I guess, angle in from where we were,” Kim said. “I would have to admit that I wasn’t planning to go that aggressive. I did push it right. So just letting you guys know. Yeah, I guess, yeah, I got lucky.”
Liu made a par and Sung had a bogey, hitting her third over the green and past Kim’s second.
“I really didn’t have high expectations,” Kim said. “Just really tried to play my game. Didn’t try to force anything. Just trying to I guess go with the flow. I’m still speechless that it’s kind of done already and I got the job done.”
