Tough round tempers Tiger, but he's still thinking big

Tiger Woods was frustrated after an even-par 72 Friday, but he said matter-of-factly that a victory is still "do-able." What he's got to do to pull off the comeback, he said, is clean up his rounds.

By Helen Ross, PGATOUR.COM Chief of Correspondents

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Tiger Woods was grim-faced as he walked out of the scoring trailer Friday afternoon.

A bogey at the 18th hole, for the second day in a row no less, will do that to the No. 1 player in the world.

As frustrated as he was, though, Woods waited patiently for ESPN to cue the requisite live shot and then walked over, hand on hip, to talk to 15 reporters in the pen.

The questions, to be fair, were less than scintillating. Woods was tight-lipped, as well.

Tough day at the office, Woods was asked to start the proceedings. “Yeah,” came the succinct response.

And the problem? “Conditions were tough. It was just tough all around.”

Was the wind difficult? “You might say so.” The follow-up got a positively garrulous answer, though.

“I thought it was pretty much difficult all the way around,” Woods said. “Not only is it blowing, but it’s also changing whether it’s in or down, so you can go through pretty much a three-club swing.”

And so it went, for just under two minutes as Woods assessed the round of 72 that left him at 2 under for the tournament and seven strokes off the lead held jointly by Kenny Perry and Chad Campbell.

Woods has made up bigger deficits over 36 holes, of course. He was nine behind at the midway point of the 1999 Buick Invitational and eight back at Pebble Beach the following year. He’s erased seven stroke deficits four other times during his career.

This is Augusta National, too, where Woods has won four times already. He came from six strokes behind Chris DiMarco and beat the Florida Gator in a playoff in 2005. He made up four strokes on the weekend when he won the Masters in 2002.

And this year? Is seven strokes doable? “Yeah,” came the reply.

“Hopefully, I’ve got to play a little bit better than I have -- make a few more putts, and clean up my rounds,” Woods said. “I made a few more putts today but I still didn’t make enough.”

Woods said the weather could impact the weekend, too. Thunderstorms are expected to arrive overnight and could soften the greens, which would make Augusta National ripe for attacking on Saturday.

“Got to play smart,” Woods concluded. “Birdies can be had if you time the wind up correctly and hit a good shot, but still, you’ve got to be smart about it.”

Two more questions, and he was gone to figure things out.