Tiger makes it a clean world sweep

CARLSBAD, Calif. -- Tiger Woods always knew the final piece of his World Golf Championships collection would be the toughest for him to win.

David Toms made sure of that.

Leading by as many as five holes, Woods recovered from a few shaky shots and held off a gritty charge by Toms Sunday to win the Match Play Championship, making him the first player to capture all four of the WGC tournaments.

"This is the hardest to win," Woods said. "Yeah, it's physically grueling, but I think it's more mentally grueling because of the ebb and flow of match play. If we had to do this every week, every pro's playing career would be about 10 years."

The final match must have felt like a lifetime.

Woods was 4 up after the morning round, and kept that margin with 11 holes to play. Two sloppy bogeys and a few clutch birdies by Toms brought high drama to La Costa.

Woods, who never trailed, finally closed him out when Toms took four shots to reach the 17th green and Woods saved par from a bunker, holing a 3-foot putt.

"He never really got all the momentum," Woods said after a 2-and-1 victory. "He got a lot of it, but not all of it."

Woods won for the 36th time on the PGA Tour and earned $1,050,000.

Since returning from his two-month break for knee surgery, he has won twice and tied for fifth in three tournaments.

Toms earned $600,000. Despite losing, he enhanced his reputation as a player who squeezes everything out of his game until the very end.

"I'm not going to quit," Toms said. "That's not my nature. We're on national TV and I wanted to last a long time. I didn't want to be embarrassed. When he got 5 up, I just had to dig deep and not give in."

Woods was 5 up after 19 holes and had an 8-foot birdie putt.

Toms rolled in a 35-footer to win the hole and seize momentum, which got even stronger when Woods made back-to-back bogeys on the 26th and 27th holes.

Ultimately, it was too large a deficit to overcome for Toms, especially against the best player in the world who again proved to be a master at match play.

He won three straight U.S. Junior Amateur titles and three straight U.S. Amateurs, but was 0-4 in match-play tournaments as a pro.

That changed during a dominant week at La Costa, where he made only five bogeys on a tough course and played only 112 holes, the fewest of any winner in the five-year history of the Accenture Match Play Championship.

The World Golf Championships began in 1999, and Woods has won them all -- three times the NEC Invitational, twice the American Express and the 2000 World Cup with David Duval.

The missing piece was the format he loves most.

Woods showed that on the final hole. Clinging to a 1-up lead, he watched Toms hit his drive into the rough behind some trees. Woods, who had hit driver on the 483-yard hole all week, reached for the 3-wood and split the middle.

"Whatever it took to get the ball in play to put pressure back on him," Woods said. "I was hot at myself for hitting that 7-iron into the bunker. But I had a great lie -- just get it below the hole so I had an uphill putt -- and I was able to do that."

Toms' approach went left into rough so deep he could barely identify his ball. He hacked out short of the green, and his chip for par turned away.

"I still thought I could chip it in," Toms said. "You don't give in until you're done."

Adam Scott, who pushed Woods to 19 holes in the semifinals, was 6 up through eight holes in the 18-hole consolation match against Peter Lonard. Scott didn't make another birdie until the 18th, winning 1 up.

Scott earned $480,000, the largest check of his career. Lonard won $390,000.

Toms trailed by as many as five holes, but never panicked. He has more grit than glitz, and hung around just long enough for Woods to start making a few mistakes.

Woods, so relentless with his power and accuracy in the morning round, made only two bogeys in his first 102 holes at La Costa before making them back-to-back on Nos. 8 and 9 in the afternoon round.

Suddenly, his lead was only 2 up. Toms twice cut that in half, holing a 15-foot birdie putt on the 15th hole to give himself a chance.

Still, the match was really decided over the first 18 holes when Woods applied relentless pressure off the tee with power and accuracy.

"I got down too far to come back," Toms said.

Woods was 4 up after the morning round, a margin that seemed even larger considering the limited opportunities Toms had to win a hole.