The sky was getting so dark that Jason Day could barely see the flag on the 14th hole, much less the small crowd that waited out a two-hour storm delay on Friday at The Players Championship. The way he was playing, he sure could hear them.
His five-iron from 190 yards into a strengthening wind rolled to the back of the green and settled two feet away from the pin.
“A great shot,” said Day, who can be stingy with self-praise.
Photo: AFP
His second big birdie to end his long day stretched his lead to three shots before it was too dark to continue and Day stepped into a van for a short drive to the clubhouse. His first task was to check the wind for the morning, when he had to finish four holes.
He already was 14-under-par. He was on a record-setting pace at the TPC Sawgrass and he could only think about pushing.
“I’m at 14-under par, I’ve got a good lead going on, I just can’t sit back,” Day said. “I need to keep pushing forward. And the moment that I lose a little bit of focus and make a few mental errors and mistakes, that’s when I let the field back in and I just can’t afford to do that.”
Photo: John David Mercer-USA TODAY
Shane Lowry had a 68 and was at 11-under 133, a solid round that only got going when he hit a wedge so badly that it did not each reach the island green at the par-three 17th. He managed to escape with bogey, and then holed a wedge from about 180 yards on the 18th hole for eagle.
Two tough pars at the end of his round meant he was likely to be in the final group with Day. Not bad for a guy who was hitting it so badly on Wednesday that he was dreading the thought of even playing.
“I thought I’d be booking a plane ticket now, how I was feeling on Wednesday,” Lowry said. “Yeah, golf is a funny game. Sometimes low expectations brings good results and high expectations brings no results.”
Jordan Spieth was just hopeful of a tee time yesterday, as was Phil Mickelson.
Spieth, looking frustrated as ever, got to the projected cut of two-under with back-to-back birdies to start the back nine, only to catch a bad break when a rake kept his ball from rolling into the bunker and stayed on the steep slope leading to the sand. The best he could do was chip over the green and he made bogey, and his tee shot was wild to the right on the 15th when they stopped because of darkness. Spieth was at one-under.
Mickelson had to make an eight-foot par putt on the par-five 16th to stay at one-under. He was to return at 9:15am to play the 17th and 18th, likely needing a birdie on one of them to make the cut.
Greg Norman set the 36-hole record of 14-under 130 at The Players in 1994, the year the Shark made only one bogey the entire week. Day looks just as good and has yet to drop a shot over the 32 holes he has played. He ended his day with a 40-foot birdie putt down the slope at No. 13 and the five-iron for his tap-in birdie at the 14th.
“Hopefully, I can hit some good, solid shots coming in and at least try to get a couple more birdies,” Day said.
Will Wilcox made a hole-in-one on the island-green 17th, one of the most famous par-threes in golf.
Wilcox hit a pitching wedge from 147 yards and his yellow golf ball rolled a few feet into the cup.
It was the first ace on the 17th hole at the TPC Sawgrass since Miguel Angel Jimenez in 2002. Only five other players have made a hole-in-one on the 17th in the 35 years at the Stadium Course — Paul Azinger, Joey Sindelar, Fred Couples, Brian Claar and Brad Fabel.
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