Three years after Furyk became the sixth player on tour with a 59, he took it even lower Sunday in the Travelers Championship with a 58.
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“Rather than mail it in I went to the range yesterday because I didn’t want to shoot another 72”. “I could have ripped my shirt off”. He was 1-over par entering the final round on Sunday at TPC River Highlands. Kelly, a Madison, Wis. native, played four seasons of college golf at the University of Hartford, which is just miles from the course.
Furyk tied for fifth at 11 under, three strokes behind victor Russell Knox. Furyk remained 11-under with pars on holes 13, 14 and 15.
Furyk’s only other birdie was a 23-foot birdie putt on the par-3 16th.
The Scot hit his tee shot on the par-4 18th right and into the crowd, and his second shot into a green-side bunker below the hole. “You’ve got to have skill and need a lot of luck, to pull the right club, get the right bounce, read the right putt, get the speed right, hole after hole after hole after hole”.
Jim Furyk celebrates after shooting a PGA-record 58 during the final round of the Travelers Championship golf tournament in Cromwell, Conn., Sunday, Aug. 7, 2016. “I just kept telling myself, this is your chance to make a putt to have a great celebration and hear the roars. I’m glad it went in”.
Justin Thomas was nearly an afterthought despite shooting 62 and stringing together five straight birdies. Rodgers shot a 68.
Furyk was 12 under for his final round alone after an eagle and 10 birdies, and he also became the first player in Tour history to record two sub-60 rounds after his 59 at the BMW Masters in 2013.
Furyk made a hot start, completing the front nine in eight-under 27 thanks to six birdies, as well as an unlikely eagle at the par-four third, where he holed out from 135 yards.
Then came another birdie, then a par on No. 5. Furyk then calmly knocked in the comebacker for the first 58 in PGA Tour history.
But there he was, in the third group of the day Sunday morning, 17 shots behind leader Daniel Berger, trying to turn in a decent performance at the Travelers Championship. But he struggled, making four consecutive bogeys to start his back nine. He finished with a 74 to tie with Furyk, Robert Garrigus and Tyrone Van Aswegen at 11 under.
Kelly began the day at 7 under. Headed to the PGA Tour Champions in November, he acknowledged the fans were chanting “Jerry!”
“The love that they showed me this week, that’s about the best of any year”, he said about the fans.
“Late on the front nine I felt good with my short irons”.
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OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) – Wesley Bryan won the Digital Ally Open in a playoff to earn an immediate PGA Tour promotion as a three-time victor this season on the Web.com Tour. He circled back-to-backs on 13 and 14, both from inside of seven feet, before squaring bogey-4 at 16 (failed scramble). He’s 131st in the FedEx Cup standings, putting him in jeopardy of missing the playoffs.
