Columnist Peter Benton: Leonard leads President’s Cup list

Peter Benton

Wednesday, May 6, 1998 | 9:12 a.m.

PETER BENTON is a local golfer. His column appears Wednesdays.

WITH HIS VICTORY in The Players Championship, Justin Leonard moved into first place on the list of eligibles for the U.S. Team's 1998 Presidents Cup Match.

The 25-year-old Texan has accumulated 3,481,456 points to overtake Tiger Woods, who had led the U.S. list for the previous three weeks.

Following on the eligibility rankings for the 10-man team (plus two captain's choices) are: David Duval, Mark Calcavecchia, Scott Hoch, Davis Love, Phil Mickelson, Jim Furyk, Tom Lehman and Mark O'Meara.

The International team's present standings are led by Ernie Els and includes the questionable Greg Norman, Nick Price, Jumbo Ozaki, Steve Elkington, Frank Nobilo, Mark McNulty, Shigeki Maruyama and Craig Parry.

The tournament matches America's best golfers versus top nonEuropean players every other year.

Fryatt up

After missing the cut in last week's Seoul Open, former UNLV standout Edward Fryatt flew home to Las Vegas for a week prior to competing in next week's Guam Open.

Fryatt, who has won both the Indian and Chinese Opens this year, has won more than $100,000 already this season.

He plans to travel to England early July in an attempt to qualify for the British Open July 16-19 at the Royal Berkdale Golf Club.

Simon says

Local golfer DeRay Simon shot 73-71-67--211 over the par-72 Sun City Grand golf course in Arizona and tied for second place (three strokes behind winner Robert Gaona) in the recent Arizona Senior Open, played under the auspices of the Southwest Section of the PGA.

Other Las Vegans who fared well included Bill Farkas and Tom Storey, who tied for fifth at 213. Farkas fired rounds of 70-71-72 while Storey had 71-71-71.

Pahrump's Jim Kirwin, after rounds of 70-71-74--215, placed eighth overall and Ray Beallo tied for 26th after shooting 75-76-74--228.

Singh's song blue

Fijian Vijay Singh's bid to take sole possession of fifth place on the PGA Tour's all-time consecutive cuts made list fell short at the Masters, where Singh missed his first cut since the 1995 PGA Championship. Singh's streak of 53 in a row tied Tom Kite.

Byron Nelson, who finished in the money in 113 consecutive tournaments, is the all-time leader, followed by Jack Nicklaus (105), Hale Irwin (86) and Dow Finsterwald (72).

Rocco Mediate, with a streak of 15 in a row, is the current leader.