GALLOWAY, N.J. - The only stat Stacy Lewis, the No. 3 player in the world, cares about is wins. In that column for 2015, she sees a zero for the year.
But looking at her 2015, the stats are eerily similar to the profile that had her standing on the stage at the end of year Rolex Awards in December as the first American since 1992 to sweep as the winner of the Rolex Player of the Year, Vare Trophy and money list title.
Her 2015 tour-leading scoring average of 69.53 just so happens to be her exact scoring average from a year ago. It is why, although Lewis craves a win, she’s not concerned that she hasn’t gotten one to date.
“I’m not to concerned about, you know, I’m doing a lot of really good things right now,” Lewis said. “There’s a couple of those tournaments I’d like to have won, but you know, that’s golf, and it’s getting harder and harder to win out here. There’s some amazing players right now, and you know, I just gotta keep doing what I’m doing because obviously there’s nothing wrong with it.”
If there’s a time to win, it’s now. Over the course of the next eight tournaments, three major championships sit in that stretch, and she’s the defending champion at the ShopRite LPGA Classic Presented by Acer this week in Atlantic City and next month at the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship Presented by P&G.
“This is the time,” Lewis said. “I’ve talked about all year, the summertime is when you want to be playing your best golf. That’s when we have our biggest events, the most number of events. So this really for a lot of people and for me is a kick start into the rest of the year.”
That was the plan a year ago, too, but she piqued too early. She played her best golf of the season from January through June, churning out three wins, four runner-ups, and six additional top-10 finishes in her first 15 starts. But come July, she was unable to continue that form for the remainder of the year.
“The problem has been the last few years, I get to about August and I’m exhausted,” Lewis said. “And so – and I get, you know, it’s usually around the Canadian Open, where I have no energy left. So I’ve really tried to plan my schedule out better to take weeks off and to go do other things.”
She didn’t even pick up her clubs Memorial Day weekend in preparation for the grind ahead. Still, she feels like her game’s where she wants it heading into the heart of the season. After five attempts at finding the right driver that fits her this season, she thinks she has the one which has been in her bag for three events in a row now. And although she isn’t pleased that her greens in regulation are down from a year ago, she’s got reason to believe she’s just on the cusp of the breakthrough she’s searched for this season.
“The putting’s been really good. The ball striking has been a little bit iffy, but if the ball striking was just a little bit better, I think I would have won a little bit more,” Lewis said. “But putting has been really good, really solid, which I’m happy about. I’ve been working really hard on it. I worked on it a lot over the off season, so I’m happy to see that coming together.”
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