Key events
There will be exceptions, of course there will, but as a rule, today will most likely be more about not slipping back than making huge strides forward. See Scottie Scheffler in the previous entry. He’s being followed in the group behind by Rory McIlroy, who also gets up and down from greenside sand at 1, but does so to save his par. A tickly little seven-foot left-to-right slider will have settled a few nerves. The 2011 champion remains at level par.
The world number one Scottie Scheffler is looking to complete a career slam this week. He’s not brought his best stuff so far, though, and after opening rounds of 72 and 68, started his weekend at level par. And it looks like his struggles are going to continue. He pulls his opening drive into the semi-rough down the left of 1, then sends his second into knee-deep fescue. His third trickles into a greenside bunker, and though he does well to get up and down, that’s an opening bogey … and he follows it with another at the par-three 2nd, finding more sand and not getting particularly close with his splash out. Scheffler slips back to +2 in short order.
Of the 54 players from the 72-strong field who have already played some golf today, there are only five currently under par for their rounds. Emiliano Grillo is the main mover: he’s three under after 15 holes, moving up the leaderboard to level par overall. Meanwhile Tommy Fleetwood started slowly with bogey at 3, but he’s cancelled that out, and then some, with eagle at the par-five 5th, and consolidated that gain with a sandy par at 6. He’s level par for the week as well, and as we’ve just seen, knows his way around this golf course all right.
Shinnecock weekends are usually brutal. Just ask Phil Mickelson. As just mentioned, only one player was under par after 26 holes eight years ago; there were none by the end of the week. (To be fair, eventual winner Brooks Koepka shot 68 on the final day to finish at +1, while runner-up Tommy Fleetwood broke the course record with a 63, but let’s not muddy the waters.) It’s perhaps more relevant to note that 11 players were under par at the halfway stage in 2004, but only two remained so by the time Retief Goosen won his second US Open on the Sunday. That latter tournament could well be what the USGA are going for here. Either way, it could be a long, hard grind this afternoon for some of the biggest names in golf.
Dylan Wu might have been the first to run up a big score today, but chances are he won’t be the last. The USGA kept the greens under strict control on the first couple of days, hence a relatively large number of players under par after 36 holes: ten this year, compared to one in 2018, for example. But they’ve let them off the leash today, giving them a trim, and the stimp reading has reportedly moved from just over 10 to just over 11. Throw in winds of up to 30mph today, and good luck everyone! The wind might drop a bit later in the day, so there could be a slight advantage to the leaders, but let’s not expect miracles.
Here we go, then … and what better way to start our much-admired Moving Day coverage with a hoary old observation? And it’s this: there isn’t a golfer on the planet who won’t have, at some point in their golfing life, wondered why on earth they bother, and why they’re doing this to themselves. The latest illustration of this maxim is Dylan Wu. The 29-year-old American and his caddie – his brother Jeremy, carrying the bag for the first time since seeing off cancer, but that’s another story – cavorted around the 18th green after a seven-foot par putt went in to become the final player to make the cut. And so to the 1st green this morning. A five-putt leading to a quadruple-bogey eight. Wu has ended his third round now, carding 82; only young Icelandic amateur Arni Sveinsson has shot a higher round this week (84 on Thursday). Why do we bother? Why do we do this to ourselves? But you know and I know that Wu will be back tomorrow, looking to improve on his current position, 72nd in a field of 72 at +16. He may well shoot under par. Golf’s like that. It’s why everyone bothers, and keeps coming back.
Preamble
It’s Moving Day at Shinnecock Hills! Here’s what the top of the leaderboard looked like after two tough treks around the oldest clubhouse in US golf …
-7: Wyndham Clark
-3: Matt Fitzpatrick, Xander Schauffele, Sam Stevens, Tom Kim
-2: Collin Morikawa
-1: Justin Thomas, Harry Higgs, Sam Burns, Sahith Theegale
E: William Mouw, Ryder Cowan (a), Ryo Hisatsune, Gary Woodland, Akshay Bhatia, Keith Mitchell, Rory McIlroy, Maverick McNealy, Brian Harman, Scottie Scheffler, Alex Fitzpatrick
… here’s a selected list of big names to have missed the cut …
Bryson DeChambeau, Viktor Hovland, Rickie Fowler, Patrick Reed, Harris English, Shane Lowry, Jon Rahm, Patrick Cantlay, Cameron Smith, Si Woo Kim, Min Woo Lee, Sepp Straka, Adam Scott, Brooks Koepka, Padraig Harrington, Graeme McDowell and defending champion JJ Spaun
… and here are today’s tee times (all BST). Plenty of third-round water has already passed under the bridge, so we’ll get onto that immediately. Here we go! It’s on!
2pm: Dylan Wu, Jacob Bridgeman
2.11pm: Chris Gotterup, Eric Lee (a)
2.22pm: Peter Uihlein, Caleb Surratt
2.33pm: Marek Fleming (a), Robert MacIntyre
2.44pm: Nico Echavarria, Hideki Matsuyama
2.55pm: Bud Cauley, Neal Shipley
3.06pm: Laurie Canter, Michael Kim
3.17pm: Jackson Koivun (a), Miles Russell (a)
3.33pm: Patrick Rodgers, Emiliano Grillo
3.44pm: James Nicholas, Angel Hidalgo
3.55pm: Jordan Spieth, Joaquin Niemann
4.06pm: Russell Henley, Dustin Johnson
4.17pm: Ryan Fox, Michael Brennan
4.28pm: Pierceson Coody, Max Greyserman
4.39pm: Kurt Kitayama, Tyrrell Hatton
5.50pm: Cameron Young, Im Sung-jae
5.06pm: Adrien Dumont de Chassart, Spencer Tibbets
5.17pm: JT Poston, Ben Griffin
5.28pm: Andrew Putnam, John Parry
5.39pm: Jackson Van Paris, Ben James
5.50pm: Tommy Fleetwood, Ludvig Åberg
6.01pm: Keegan Bradley, Johnny Keefer
6.12pm: Ben Kohles, Justin Rose
6.28pm: Corey Conners, Aaron Rai
6.39pm: Zac Blair, Max McGreevy
6.50pm: Niklas Norgaard, Alex Fitzpatrick
7.01pm: Scottie Scheffler, Brian Harman
7.12pm: Maverick McNealy, Rory McIlroy
7.23pm: Kevin Mitchell, Akshay Bhatia
7.34pm: Gary Woodland, Ryo Hisatsune
7.50pm: Ryder Cowan (a), William Mouw
8.01pm: Sahith Theegala, Sam Burns
8.12pm: Harry Higgs, Justin Thomas
8.23pm: Collin Morikawa, Tom Kim
8.34pm: Sam Stevens, Xander Schauffele
8.45pm: Matt Fitzpatrick, Wyndham Clark
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