ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Tiger Woods turns 49 at the end of the month and he has one pressing goal that relates to his golf. He wants to prolong that inevitable day when his son beats him over 18 holes.
They will be playing with — not against — each other this week for the fifth straight year at the PNC Championship, a 36-hole tournament so meaningful to them and everyone else in the field that Woods was determined to play for the first time since a sixth back surgery in September.
Word got out, however, that 15-year-old Charlie finally beat his 15-time major champion dad.
“He beat me for nine holes,” Woods said, an important clarification to him. “He has yet to beat me for 18 holes. That day is coming. I'm just prolonging it as long as I possibly can.”
As for the details, Woods talked about the typical banter between them and how much fun they have. It was clear he was not going to share the hole-by-hole of the loss.
Winning is a goal, but not the priority, at the PNC Championship. It's a happy end of the year for all 20 teams at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club Orlando, an event that pairs the winners of majors or The Players Championship with a family member.
Woods played five tournaments this year and completed only one of them, making the cut at the Masters for a record 24th consecutive year. He had to play 23 holes on Friday at Augusta National in a raging wind, posting a 72 for his best round of the year. He followed that with an 82, an example of ups and downs from a player whose body has been wracked with injury.
“I'm not going to feel what I’m used to feeling,” Woods said. “The recovery has gotten to be the hardest part. But over the course of rounds, weeks, months, it gets harder.”
He missed the cut in the next three majors and then had surgery on his lower back in September to alleviate some of the spasms he had been feeling. The timing of the surgery was related to the PNC Championship.
Woods chose not to play the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas two weeks ago, saying he wasn't competitively sharp enough to handle Scottie Scheffler, Patrick Cantlay and Justin Thomas among a 20-man field of players from the top 40 in the world.
This might as well be his fifth major because he plays with his son.
“That was one of the reasons why I had the surgery done earlier, so that hopefully I could give myself the best chance to be with Charlie and be able to play,” Woods said. “I’m not competitive right now, but I just want to be able to have the experience again. This has always been one of the bigger highlights of the year for us as a family, and now we get to have that moment together again.”
The surgery was on his back, but Woods said his right leg, which was mangled in a February 2021 car crash outside Los Angeles, remains the biggest physical obstacle.
Even so, he chose to walk the pro-am on Friday instead of riding a cart, which is allowed for players because the tournament is co-sanctioned by the PGA Tour Champions.
Team Woods has yet to win since they began playing in 2020. They finished second the following year by two shots to John Daly and his college son, when Charlie was 12. He is adding inches to his height every year, filling out and pounding the golf ball. Woods plans to rely on his son's tee shots in the scramble format.
They will play the opening round Saturday with Justin Leonard and son Luke, who goes to The Benjamin School in North Palm Beach with Charlie and is going to Villanova next year.
Charlie Woods went through U.S. Open qualifying for the first time this year and failed to advance out of the first stage. He qualified for the U.S. Junior Amateur at Oakland Hills but didn't come close to making it to match play.
Woods appreciated that his son is under a spotlight few others his age face.
“I was always reminding him, ‘Just be you.’ Charlie is Charlie. Yes, he’s my son. He’s going to have my last name and it’s going to be part of his core. But I just want him to be just himself and be his own person. That’s what we can only do,” Woods said.
“I always encourage it, for him to carve his own name, carve his own path and have his own journey,” he said. “I think he’s doing a great job. In this day and age where everyone is basically media, with all the phones, being constantly filmed and constantly people watching, that’s just part of his generation, and that’s part of the world that he has to maneuver through.”
AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
Charlie Woods, left, watches his father Tiger Woods, right, watches during the final round of the PNC Championship golf tournament, Dec. 18, 2022, in Orlando, Fla. (AP Photo/Kevin Kolczynski)
ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Jayden Daniels sitting in the second half wasn’t the plan when the playoff-bound Washington Commanders visited the Dallas Cowboys with only seeding at stake.
Leg soreness led coach Dan Quinn to make the move, and Marcus Mariota turned it into a winning one.
Mariota threw a 5-yard touchdown pass to Terry McLaurin with 3 seconds left, lifting Washington to a 23-19 victory over Dallas on Sunday and clinching the sixth seed in the NFC playoffs for the Commanders.
Mariota threw for two scores and ran for a TD after replacing Daniels, who said he was fine with his coach's decision but later was adamant that they would have had “to drag me off the field,” if his team had been in a win-or-go-home situation.
Instead, the Commanders (12-5) only had playoff seeding on the line, but Quinn's move ended up sparking an offense that produced just 64 yards before the break.
“We were going to have to use the quarterback’s legs more, so it was really my decision to say, ‘Hey let’s go this route,’” Quinn said. “It wasn’t a pre-determined one.”
It turned out Washington didn’t need the rally to keep the sixth seed because Green Bay lost to Chicago on a late field goal. But the victory meant the Commanders finished the regular season on a four-game win streak that answered a three-game skid capped by a loss at home to Dallas.
The Commanders will visit either Tampa Bay or the Los Angeles Rams in the wild-card round next weekend. The Packers will visit NFC East champion Philadelphia, the No. 2 seed.
Brandon Aubrey kicked four field goals for the Cowboys in the first regular-season start for quarterback Trey Lance since Week 2 of 2022, when he was still with San Francisco a year after the 49ers traded up to get him third overall in the draft.
Rico Dowdle's 2-yard TD run lifted the Cowboys to a 19-16 lead midway through the fourth quarter.
Quinn already had his team in the playoffs in his return to Dallas, where he was the defensive coordinator the past three seasons, which also ended with 12-5 playoff teams.
The last of those came crashing down with a blowout wild-card loss at home to Green Bay, and the coaches and players Quinn left behind never had a chance to escape the malaise in a 2024 season that was troublesome from the early days.
Now, the Cowboys (7-10) await the fate of coach Mike McCarthy, who is on an expiring contract after three winning seasons and two losing records, unable to get the club past the divisional round of the playoffs for the first time since the mid-1990s.
“For us to go out there and compete and finish our commitment, that to me was a given,” McCarthy said. “I thought in some ways, the game was a little bit of a microcosm of our season, just going down to the last play. The little things that we didn’t do, was part of the reason why we didn’t win the game.”
Daniels was 6 of 12 for 38 yards when he went to the bench after the break, while Mariota finished 15 of 18 for 161 yards and had a 33-yard run that helped set up the winning score, which capped a 91-yard drive.
“He's such a cool teammate,” Quinn said. “It was fun to be able to celebrate him today because of the work that he does behind the scenes. It takes a lot to be ready like that.”
Lance was 20 of 34 for 244 yards with no touchdowns or interceptions in his first extensive action since the preseason. He threw five interceptions in the preseason finale.
The Cowboys traded a fourth-round pick for Lance last year after Lance lost the battle for the backup job with the Niners. Cooper Rush started the first eight games after Dak Prescott's season-ending hamstring injury this season.
It didn't take Micah Parsons long to make good on his promise that he would get to 10 sacks for the fourth time in his four seasons with Dallas despite missing four games with a high ankle sprain.
Parsons dropped Daniels for a 4-yard loss on the first play of the game and got him again on a 9-yarder two plays later. He had 2 1/2 sacks to finish the season with 12. He is the fourth player with double-digit sacks in his first four seasons, and the other three are in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Washington's running game struggled despite the return of running back Austin Ekeler, who left the Nov. 24 loss to the Cowboys with a concussion. While Mariota and Daniels did some damage with their legs, Ekeler and Brian Robinson Jr. combined for 22 yards on eight carries.
None of Aubrey's kicks were from 50 yards, but he held on to what is now an NFL record for the most from at least that distance in a season at 14. Houston’s Ka’imi Fairbairn started and ended the day at 13, and Pittsburgh’s Chris Boswell had a 54-yarder Saturday to finish at 13 as well.
The Commanders are in the playoffs for the first time since 2020, and in the postseason with a winning record for the first time since 2015.
AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
Dallas Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons (11) celebrates a sack with defensive end Chauncey Golston (99) and linebacker Buddy Johnson (57) during the first half of an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Josh McSwain)
Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels (5) runs with the ball as Dallas Cowboys defensive end Chauncey Golston (99) chases him during the first half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Josh McSwain)
Dallas Cowboys wide receiver KaVontae Turpin reacts during a play against the Washington Commandersduring the first half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Jerome Miron)
Washington Commanders head coach Dan Quinn reacts to a fourth-down stop against the Dallas Cowboys during the first half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)
Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy looks on during the second half of an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)
Washington Commanders wide receiver Terry McLaurin, left, goes up to make a touchdown catch against Dallas Cowboys cornerback DaRon Bland during the second half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. The Commanders won 23-19. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)
Dallas Cowboys cornerback DaRon Bland (26) reacts after Washington Commanders wide receiver Terry McLaurin caught a touchdown pass in front of him during the second half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. The Commanders won 23-19. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)