New York ? Annika Sorenstam has not given up on winning the Grand Slam, for no other reason than she is very determined and very good.

It just won’t happen this year.

And considering what has transpired since her dream evaporated in the mile high air at the U.S. Women’s Open, she might look back at 2005 as the best chance she ever had to capture all four majors.

Morgan Pressel, 17, and Brittany Lang, 19, tied for second that week at Cherry Hills, Colo. Michelle Wie, 15, turned in two more captivating performances by nearly making the cut on the PGA Tour and advancing to the quarterfinals of the U.S. Amateur Public Links in her improbable quest to qualify for the Masters.

Paula Creamer, 18, left Sorenstam and everyone else in her wake last week at the Evian Masters to win by eight shots for her second victory this year.

The LPGA Tour was all Annika all the time for the first half of the season.

Now, some of the focus has shifted to girls half her age, and that has given women’s golf even more sizzle.

“It doesn’t get much better, really,” Laura Davies said Tuesday. “It just shows how strong the women’s game is now, and it is exciting, because there are so many different characters involved.”

The leading role is still played by Sorenstam.

For now, all she can hope for is to win the Women’s British Open this week and join the elite company of Pat Bradley (1986), Wright (1961) and Babe Zaharias (1950) as the only women to win three majors in one season.

“It would be great to bounce back after the U.S. Open with another major,” Sorenstam said.

For the longest time, Royal Birkdale was shaping up as the scene of something truly special.

Sorenstam won the first two majors with such ease – by eight shots at the Kraft Nabisco and by three shots at the LPGA Championship – that it seemed inevitable she would arrive in England the last week in July with only a tough links course standing in the way of a Grand Slam.

That all changed at Cherry Hills.

Sorenstam felt jangled nerves on her opening tee shot. A four-putt for double bogey on the sixth hole of the third round essentially ended her bid for the third leg of the slam, and she wound up in a tie for 23rd at the U.S. Women’s Open, her worst finish of the year.

Sorenstam started the year winning six of eight tournaments. After winning the second leg of the slam, she is 0-for-3. Never mind how Sorenstam has played. The intrigue is how the kids have fared.

Not long after she dropped out of the hunt at Cherry Hills, Wie and Pressel worked their way to the top of the leaderboard, with Creamer one shot behind going into the final round. Wie and Creamer made a mess of the last day, but Pressel looked like a winner until Birdie Kim holed out a bunker shot on the 18th hole.

In just five months, Creamer has become arguably the top American star on the LPGA Tour. Wie already is one of the most recognizable faces in golf. Pressel walks with a swagger. Golf is thriving.