Muñoz upstages home stars
He shoots 60, leads by 4 at Byron Nelson
McKINNEY, Texas — Sebastián Muñoz was standing in the middle of the fairway on the 18th hole thinking about his shot at a 59 in the first round of the Byron Nelson. After missing the green, he became the first player in PGA Tour history with two rounds of 60 in the same season.
Muñoz made a nice flop shot from the right of the green, then holed the 12-foot birdie putt to wrap up his 12-under round that included an impressive surge after his only bogey.
“I mean, I wanted to give myself a chance. … It was 250 (yards) to the pin into the wind. I kind of wanted to hit like a bullet, like a little draw,” Muñoz said. “I knew if I want to hit it close, had to be a fade, soft-landed shot. I tried to do that. Overdid it and ended up with a 60, which is really good around here.”
Good for a four-stroke lead over defending champion K.H. Lee, Mito Pereira, Peter Malnati and Justin Lower. Kyle Wilshire, a Monday qualifier making only his third career PGA Tour start, was alone in sixth after a 65 that included a near hole-in-one when he banged the flagstick with his tee shot at the 230-yard, par-3 seventh.
Lee won the 2021 Nelson at 25-under par when his low round was a 65. He played in the same group Thursday with Scottie Scheffler and Justin Spieth, the major champions from Dallas whose first PGA Tour events were both as teenagers at the Nelson when it was still at TPC Four Seasons.
Scheffler, the No. 1 player in the world, and Spieth both shot 67. So did 11th-ranked Dustin Johnson, who started on the back nine with five birdies and then had four more, along with four bogeys.
It was the first individual start for Scheffler since winning the Masters five weeks ago. Threetime major champ Spieth, ranked No. 9, played for the first time since his RBC Heritage victory the week after the Masters.
LPGA: In Clifton, N.J., Madelene Sagstrom shot a flawless 9-under 63 during a round she felt holes kept getting larger to take one-stroke lead over Megan Khang after the first round of the Cognizant Founders Cup.
Nasa Hataoka, who won in Los Angeles in April before taking time off, was third after a 65 on the Upper Montclair Country Club course, roughly 10 miles from New York City.
Bianca Pagdanganan, Amy Yang and Giulia Molinaro were tied for fourth at 66, a shot ahead of a group that included Lexi Thompson and Minjee Lee. Two-time defending champion and top-ranked Jin Young Ko shot a 69.
Sagstrom, a runner-up last year in the Women’s British Open, made birdies in batches, finishing with nine in a bogey-free round.
Anna Davis, the 16-year-old who won the recent Augusta National Women’s Amateur, shot a 70 playing on a sponsor’s exemption. She made the cut in the Palos Verdes Championship in California, which was won by Marina Alex.
CHAMPIONS TOUR: In Birmingham, Ala., Steve Stricker shot a 7-under 65 to take a two-stroke lead over Miguel Angel Jimenez and Wes Short Jr. after the opening round of the Regions Tradition, the first of five PGA Tour Champions majors. Stricker, the 2019 champion, closed his bogey-free round with a birdie on No. 18 at Greystone Golf & Country Club.
Charles Schwab Cup points leader Steven Alker, two-time PGA Tour major winner John Daly and World Golf Hall of Famer Ernie Els were among the group at 4-under 68.