Northern Trust Open: Tiger Woods not here but will play next week

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

Tiger Woods hasn’t played the Northern Trust open at Riviera Country Club since 2006, and he’s not here in 2011, but Woods did make some golf news Thursday when he announced on his website what was expected: He will play his second tournament in the U.S. this year at the Accenture Match Play championships at Dove Mountain near Tucson next week.

Meanwhile, among those playing at Riviera (including five of the top 10 in the world), some of the later tee-time guys making moves up the leaderboard include 41-year-old veteran K.J. Choi of South Korea, who is three-under after his first nine, and Kevin Na, who was born in South Korea but is now an American citizen who lives in Rancho Cucamonga. He is also three-under through five holes and just birdied the par-three fourth hole. They are a shot behind five co-leaders who have finished with four-under 67s.

Two-time tournament winner Phil Mickelson, who started with back-to-back birdies to quickly jump to two-under, is now one-over after bogeying three of four holes (12, 14 and 15; Mickelson began on the back nine).

-- Diane Pucin