Creamer hooked her drive in a fairway bunker, blasted her second shot well over the green, hit her pitch shot short, chunked her fourth shot, chipped on, and 2-putted. She wound up with an 8-over-par 79 and a 219 total, 8 shots off Cristie Kerr's lead.
"If I hit a good bunker shot there, then maybe we wouldn't be sitting here talking about it," Creamer said. "Unfortunately, I hit a horrible bunker shot.
"If I could do it all over again, I would probably lay it up. My wedges have been good this weekend. I'm not sure what happened. It just kind of felt like one shot after another seven times."
Kerr, who played in the final pairing with Creamer, said she felt bad for her.
"She's one of my friends, and you always want to see her play well," Kerr said. "But that's what the USGA wanted to do, bring in risk-reward."
Ochoa's frustration. Lorena Ochoa was en route to her goal of a subpar round before going 4 over in a four-hole stretch, a run that ended with her slamming her ball to the ground behind the 16th green.
The world's top-ranked player finished with a 2-over 73 and a 221.
"I think overall today was a good day," Ochoa said. "I learned a lot of positive things, made good putts for pars and good birdies. It was a good round. The bad round" came Friday, when she shot a 79.
In her post-round interview, Ochoa did not allude to her temper flare, which was caught by the NBC-TV cameras and shown during the telecast.
Still playing for something. Fourteen-year-old Alexis Thompson experienced her worst day of the 2009 Women's Open with a 78, a round that included nine bogeys.
"I just didn't hit it good at all," she said. "You can't play this golf course if you're not hitting it good. It's just not going to go well."
With a three-day score of 222, Thompson dropped from a tie for eighth after the second round to a tie for 36th. She also fell 3 shots behind 19-year-old Jennifer Song (73-219) in the race for the gold medal given to the low amateur.
Contact staff writer Joe Juliano at 215-854-4494 or jjuliano@phillynews.com.
