Slocum has drama on and off the course

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Heath Slocum nearly withdrew from THE PLAYERS after finding out his wife had a kidney stone.

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- In the wee hours of Wednesday morning, just after the stroke of midnight, Heath Slocum's wife Victoria woke up in as much pain as he'd ever seen her.

And that includes during the birth of their two children.

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"She's tough, and when she says I can't take it anymore ... I knew she was in a lot of pain," Slocum said after finishing off a 72 in the third round of THE PLAYERS Championship.

Turns out, the nagging pain in her lower back that Victoria had been experiencing -- and dismissing -- for nearly a week actually was a kidney stone. A very big kidney stone.

Slocum immediately called his agent who took Victoria to the emergency room that night and to a local doctor the next day. A stent was inserted to push the stone back up into the kidney so she could later have a procedure designed to blast the stone into tiny pieces.

On Thursday, while Slocum was in the process of shooting a 67 in the first round of THE PLAYERS, his agents drove Victoria to their Alpharetta, Ga., home. A specialist there did the lithotripsy on Saturday morning.

There were more than a few anxious moments but Slocum said he never came close to withdrawing.

"She was obviously in a lot of pain but I would say after Wednesday I knew it was going to be OK," he said. "They had put the stent in and relieved all the pressure. When I knew she was OK and I knew she was going to be on her way home, I was pretty much here to play."

Good thing, too. Slocum has been in contention all week -- and he actually was tied for the lead on Saturday until he came to the pesky 17th hole and hit what he called an "absolutely horrific" wedge that found the water and led to a double bogey.

"(I hit it) steep, a little chunky and a slight pull, so what do you do?" said Slocum, who has now hit eight balls in the pond there. "You just keep digging."

Slocum's round of even par left him at 11 under and three strokes off Lee Westwood's lead. The man who ranks first in fairways hit and 17th in greens in regulation on TOUR has been doing his best Fred Funk imitation this week.

And when he talked with reporters after his round, the three-time TOUR champ said he'd already put the debacle at 17 out of his mind. He even joked that the 17th hole would be his "favorite" on Sunday.

"I got to 18, and I hit one of my better drives all day and one of my better iron shots," Slocum said. "So I feel like I got it out of my head, and it's just time to move forward. ...

"I'm actually playing pretty good golf right now. I feel like the putter is rolling well, so what I'm going to have to do tomorrow is play perfect and I'm going to have to finish strong. I would have liked to have had a few more shots with me, but that's what I have, so I'll just go out tomorrow and make some birdies."

Saturday morning, as he had prepared for his 2:24 p.m. date with Francesco Molinari, Slocum was receiving updates on Victoria's procedure from his mother-in-law. He finally got to speak to his wife just before he teed off.

"Everything went OK," Slocum said. "They won't know exactly how broken up the stones were for another day or two but the doctor said it went well. They took her stent out and she's already feeling better."

Slocum plans to drive home to Alpharetta on Sunday night. He'd like nothing better than to take that Waterford crystal trophy with him -- along with Victoria's Mother's Day card.