Xander Schauffele stood in the course of the ninth fairway with great stress on his shoulders. Sitting at even par, the World No. 2 wanted to birdie his closing gap of the day to earn a Saturday tee time and lengthen his consecutive made cuts streak to a formidable 59 in a row.
After watching his enjoying companions Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler every misfire, with McIlroy going into the timber and Scheffler pushing his shot to the proper of the inexperienced, it was lastly Schauffele’s flip to play. He wanted to finish up across the inexperienced on this par-5, after which get up-and-down for birdie to get to 1-under.
“I used to be desirous about the minimize line for certain,” Schauffele mentioned.
“Knew I wanted to make birdie.”
Schauffele then uncorked a towering high-draw, his finest shot of the day. His ball landed gap excessive, settling 50 toes away from the pin on the inexperienced. From there, he calmly two-putted for the birdie he wanted to publish 1-under and earn a Saturday tee time at The Gamers.
“[Wind] was fortunately serving to off the proper, so simply turned over a hybrid, aimed on the proper aspect, and will have pulled it a hair, however figured if I can hit it someplace up there on the proper aspect within the tough that’s type of the place to get up-and-down from,” Schauffele mentioned.
“Fortunately, I hit the inexperienced.”
Outdoors of that clutch shot, the two-time main winner has seemed nowhere close to the participant that gained the PGA Championship and Claret Jug a yr in the past. He missed two months earlier this season to a rib damage and returned to competitors finally week’s Arnold Palmer Invitational.
He known as his efficiency to this point “actually dangerous,” including that “every little thing” has been poor. The stats replicate that too. Schauffele has misplaced 1.374 strokes on strategy and has made solely seven birdies by way of 36 holes.
“Not hitting it shut sufficient, to duffing chips, to lacking each fairway, to hitting fairways to lacking greens,” Schauffele defined.
“It’s fairly gross, to be utterly trustworthy. So if I can eke out this minimize, that will be good. However the sport feels fairly dangerous.”
Jack Milko is a golf workers author for SB Nation’s Taking part in By. Comply with him on X @jack_milko.
