PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- Ed Fiori, who for 13 years was the only player to rally from a 54-hole deficit to beat Tiger Woods on the PGA Tour, died Sunday, the tour said on its website. He was 72. The tour said Fiori had been battling cancer. It provided no other details.
A four-time winner on the PGA Tour, no victory was more memorable than the 1996 Quad City Classic, now the John Deere Classic. Three tournaments into his pro career, a 20-year-old Woods had a one-shot lead over Fiori going into the final round at Oakwood Country Club.
Woods had a quadruple bogey on the fourth hole and a four-putt double bogey on the seventh hole. He shot 72 to tie for fifth, four shots behind Fiori. Woods won two starts later in Las Vegas. He never lost a 54-hole lead in another PGA Tour-sanctioned event until Y.E. Yang beat him in the 2009 PGA Championship at Hazeltine.
Lee Westwood overcame a deficit to beat Woods in 2000 in a European tour event in Germany.
Fiori also beat two other Hall of Fame members in playoffs, Tom Weiskopf in the 1979 Southern Open and Tom Kite in the 1982 Bob Hope Classic.
"In three of his four wins on the PGA Tour, he dueled down the stretch with future World Golf Hall of Fame members, most notably Tiger Woods in 1996," said Miller Brady, president of the PGA Tour Champions. "That grit and resolution in the face of immeasurable odds is incredibly admirable in every aspect of life, and I know he battled cancer with that same determination until the end. He will be missed by all of us at the tour."
Fiori played only 58 times on the senior circuit after turning 50, winning in 2004 in Mexico.
"I hung on for a few more years, and played for a while on the senior tour, but my back was always a problem," Fiori said in a 2019 interview with Golf.com. "I had spinal fusion surgery in 2005, and from then on, I struggled to break 80.
"Don't feel sorry for me, though. I've had a great life in a game I love. It was never easy. Lots of times, I was on that flight heading home on Friday nights," he said. "But I would not trade it for anything. Even today, people call me the Tiger killer. They don't always get their facts straight, but I don't mind. I'll never forget that weekend at the John Deere."