Kraft Nabisco Championship 2006

Exhausted but still standing, just barely, Lorena Ochoa and Michelle Wie walked by the Wall of Champions leading to the final hole and glanced at the pond surrounding the island green, both all too familiar with the tradition at the Kraft Nabisco Championship.

The winner takes a plunge.

"I'll be sure not to wear white tomorrow," Wie said, a 16-year-old sounding confident that her time has come, even though she was three shots out of the lead.

Ochoa dodged a potential two-shot swing on the par-5 18th by making a testy 5-footer for par. It gave her a 2-over 74, and left her as the oldest player in the final group at the ripe age of 24, still in control of this major championship.

"That's the plan -- be patient out there and enjoy it," she said. "Hopefully, one more round and we'll be out there."

Ochoa survived a third round that roughed up just about everyone, with wind gusting through trees lining the fairway, greens getting firmer, pressure mounting.

She finished at 9-under 207, three shot clear of Wie, her first time leading a major.

Wie, trying to become the youngest winner of a major, made a 15-foot putt on the 13th hole to escape with bogey, then gave herself five birdie putts inside 18 feet the rest of the way, making only one of them for a 73.

"Saving them up for tomorrow, I guess," she said.

Joining them will be 23-year-old Natalie Gulbis, 0-for-110 in her career on the LPGA Tour, a calendar girl who left Mission Hills with a 68, not knowing it would move her up from a tie for 14th into the final group. She hit 8-iron from 140 yards into the cup on the par-5 ninth for eagle, and wound up at 4-under 212.

Also at 4 under were Seon Hwa Lee (74) and Shi Hyun Ahn, whose 71 made her the only player to break par among the final dozen who teed off Saturday afternoon.

Ochoa was on edge to the end, when her pitching wedge spun back off the 18th green and toward the water, stopping on a tiny patch of grass. She putted it to 5 feet, while Wie had 10 feet for birdie.

Wie missed, Ochoa made and the lead remained at three shots.

"Three shots makes a big difference," Ochoa said.

Wie was fortunate she didn't tumble out of contention like so many others. She went from the right rough to the left rough, then dumped one into a bunker and came out weakly, leaving her 15 feet for bogey, already four shots behind. She made the putt and celebrated with a fist pump.

"I never thought I would do a fist pump for a bogey," she said.

She dialed in her game quickly after that, and showed that she might be ready to reach the potential everyone saw when she played in the final group of the Kraft Nabisco as a 13-year-old.

"If I'm destined to win, it's going to happen," she said. "I'm going to try my hardest."

Everyone else was spinning their wheels.

Defending champion Annika Sorenstam wasted a good start with too many bogeys and shot 73. Paula Creamer had to make birdie on the 18th hole for a 79, matching her worst score as a professional.

Ochoa began the tournament with a 62, matching the lowest score ever in a major, but the Dinah Shore course at Mission Hills has been fighting back ever since. The average score Saturday was 74.9, and only 10 players remained under par through three rounds.

Ochoa appears to have the advantage.

She is a two-time winner on the LPGA Tour, while Gulbis and Wie have not won anything since they were amateurs. And the Mexican star's the oldest, although hardly the grand old dame.

"Hopefully, I'm more mature," Ochoa said with a laugh. "Being out here helps, to know how it feels. But in a major, you never know what will happens."

There were changes in the weather -- warm and calm, then cool and windy -- but no change atop the leaderboard.

Ochoa still had a few nervous moments.

She pulled her opening tee shot into the left rough, then hooked the next shot so badly that it might have gone into a water hazard unique to Mission Hills -- a pool in someone's backyard -- had it not struck a tree. She wedged out short of the green, and escaped with only a bogey when her 8-foot putt curled into the cup.

"My best putt of the day," Ochoa said. "It gave me confidence, made me happy."

Despite a 15-foot birdie from the bunker on the par-5 second, Ochoa was far from steady, dropping two more shots before another 15-foot birdie on the par-5 ninth left her 1 over for the front nine.

No one else, however, gave her any reason to fret.

The best look at birdie Wie had on the front nine was an 18-footer, so fast down the hill at No. 6 that she barely nudged it and watched it graze the lip. Similar to the second round, it could have easily gotten away from her. Wie chipped well short on the third and missed a 12-footer for par, then ran a 40-foot birdie putt about 8 feet by the cup on the next hole, poised for another bogey. She made that one, and stayed within range.

Sorenstam tried to jump-start her chances in the first leg of the Grand Slam with birdies on two of the first four holes, she stalled after a bogey on the par-3 eighth. She wound up nine shots behind.

"I can't seem to make a putt and it's just very, very tough to be level par," Sorenstam said. "I'm playing the way that I normally play here. Just nothing is happening."

Wie was runner-up at the LPGA Championship and tied for third in the Women's British Open last year, although she was a long shot to win either. Her big chance was the U.S. Women's Open last year, when she was tied for the lead and shot 82.

"I tried to force things. That wasn't my day," she said. "Tomorrow, I'm just going to try to play calmly, find my best, take what happens."