Last week: Adam Scott won the World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship at Doral for his second straight victory.
Advertisement
Jordan Spieth was still in the hunt, but just barely.
Canadian Graham DeLaet is Haas’ nearest challenger heading into Sunday’s final round, as he is just a shot further back on seven-under after a score of 68 that included an impressive eagle at the par five 14th.
Spieth is just happy to be joining them.
Spieth expressed regret Friday for reacting to a social media heckler a day earlier, in the aftermath of his opening-round 76 in the Valspar Championship. He grew up near Innisbrook, describing his house as a par 5 away from the course. “Everything ran pretty smoothly all week, but all I know is I’m going to sleep like a baby tonight”. We can either somehow flip this one around today or…
“Every time in this position I kind of say the politically correct things”, he said. “Without him coming down, I might not have made it to the weekend”.
Over in Thailand, former NCAA champion Thomas Pieters of Belgium shot 66 and rallied to make the cut.
It was hard work, and there is plenty left. He was six shots off the lead after moving up from a Thursday tie for 117th to a tie for ninth.
Stricker began to cut back on his schedule a few years ago, and he had back surgery at the end of 2014 that limited his playing even more. It was fun having it with me this past year. This time, he took the eagle and kept running, adding a short birdie putt on the par-5 14th and a 10-foot birdie on the 16th hole to catch MacKenzie.
“So it’s not going to be easy but if I can finally get those putts from 4 to about 15 feet that are normally a strength of mine, to fall instead of lip out, then we’ve got a good opportunity”.
“He came up with the swing thought I’ve had for three days, and I’m leading”, Haas said.
“Mentally, he’s usually that guy that puts things in perspective for me”.
Haas repeated his second-round four-under-par 67 to move up two places into the outright lead at Palm Harbor.
Charley Hoffman (67) and Ryan Moore (69) were three shots behind. He had slipped to 6 over for the tournament after a bogey at the first hole – his third of the tournament on a par 5 – but rebounded with five birdies and a single bogey the rest of the way. His ball-striking and putting look solid and his demeanor is always great.
“My misses were still on the greens today”, Spieth said. I just wanted to get it rolling on the green and was lucky it went in the hole. “For the first 20 holes to be at six-over and we finished at two-over, (there are) only positives going forward”.
Advertisement
Among those missing the cut were Keegan Bradley, who followed his 67 with a 79.
