Confident Stenson shoots 66 to blow away field at TPC

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. - Managing his mind and game with equal brilliance, Henrik Stenson delivered a virtuoso performance Sunday to win The Players Championship.Now he has his Swedish eyes focused on major championships.With the only bogey-free round on another scorching day that hardened an already-firm Players Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass, Stenson dominated one of the strongest fields in golf and a tournament often referred to as the fifth major with a 6-under-par 66 to beat Ian Poulter by four shots."It's just going to give me a lot of confidence to go out there and control myself and play as well as I did today on the last day at TPC Sawgrass and to hold off such a strong field," said Stenson, 33, who finished at 12-under 276 and will move to No. 5 in the world golf rankings today. "It's just going to give me a lot of confidence going into the majors, and obviously if I can play as well as I did today, I surely can do it on a Sunday at the majors."While carnage was everywhere throughout the day 25 of the 70 players didn't break 75 Stenson turned into an unruffled highlight reel, hitting 13 of 14 fairways with towering tee shots and 14 of 18 greens. He canned a 16-foot putt from off the fringe on the seventh for his first birdie and then two-putted from 51 feet on the ninth to grab his first outright lead and make the turn in 2-under 34.Then he really kicked it in.As others tumbled or couldn't get anything going, Stenson made birdies on four of his next seven holes, including a shot from 150 yards to 2 feet at the 15th and a routine two-putt birdie on the par-5 16th."Pretty incredible," world No. 1 Tiger Woods, who finished eighth with final-round 73, said of Stenson's round. "He played great. We all know he's got all the talent in the world to do this. It was just a matter of time before he put it together. To do it on this stage was pretty impressive."Woods couldn't put much together playing in the final group, with three birdies offset by four bogeys, and he fought wayward tee shots most of the day. His playing partner, Alex Cejka, fared worse, collapsing after taking a five-stroke lead into the final 18 holes and shooting a 79 to finish in a tie for ninth. He made one birdie."I was grinding until the end, but nothing was going my way," Cejka said. "After nine holes I was a couple back, but on the back nine anything can happen. But you know, until then I didn't really make bad shots. I got some unlucky breaks, some bad lies. But that's the way it goes sometimes."Stenson, on the other hand, made it look easy. The win was his 13th as a professional and his first stroke-play victory on the PGA Tour. Stenson, who won the 2007 World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship, has nine top-five finishes in his last 20 starts, including a tie for third in the 2008 British Open and a tie for fourth in the 2008 PGA Championship.Now his confidence level is peaking as he heads toward Bethpage Black in New York for the 2009 U.S. Open. His state of mind has never been better, he said, especially since hooking up with famed sports psychologist Bob Rotella, who has worked with Padraig Harrington during the Irishman's run of three major championships in the last seven played. The two got together in the spring when Stenson's driver was awry and his mind was a tad off course."I was quite wayward, and I contacted Bob to have somebody to chat about different things and get some tips on focusing on the right stuff," Stenson said. "I probably controlled myself as well as I've ever done. I felt like even if I wouldn't have played as well today and won I still felt like if I can be in that good state of mind and control myself as well as I have done this week, I'm bound to win some great tournaments further down the line."