Rose surges to lead with 64; Rory gets rolling in Europe
Justin Rose shot a 6-under 64 in the second round at Colonial on Friday, getting to 10 under for a one-stroke lead over Emiliano Grillo in the Fort Worth Invitational.
Rose, the 2013 U.S. Open champ who won the HSBC Champions in Shanghai in his season debut last October and has four top-10 finishes, said he played “about as good as” he has overall in a long time. The Englishman had five birdies in a seven-hole stretch in the middle of his round.
Grillo had a 67 that included six consecutive holes without a par. Defending U.S. Open champion Brooks Koepka and Satoshi Kodaira were 7 under. Koepka had a 63, and Kodaira shot 67. Jordan Spieth, one of the locals and No. 3 in the world, was 3 under after a 68.
Kevin Kisner, the defending champ at Hogan’s Alley, was even par after a 68.
Champions: Kevin Sutherland birdied his last two holes for a 5-under 66 and a share of the Senior PGA Championship lead with California childhood rival Scott McCarron.
Sutherland, the Charles Schwab Cup winner, played in the third-to-last group of the day at Harbor Shores in Benton Harbor, Mich., while McCarron reached 8 under in the morning wave to emerge from a championship-record group of six tied for the first-round lead.
Sutherland’s only senior victory came in the season-ending Charles Schwab Cup Championship. McCarron has six PGA Tour Champions wins, including a major at the 2017 Senior Players Championship.
Sutherland’s lone PGA Tour victory came at McCarron’s expense in 2002 at La Costa in the Accenture Match Play Championship, when he beat the fellow Sacramento-area player 1 up in the 36-hole final.
Jerry Kelly shot a 65 to join Tim Petrovic (69), Chris Williams (68) and Joe Durant (67) at 7 under.
Nevada club professional Stuart Smith, tied for the first-round lead after a 66, had an 83 to miss the cut.
European Tour: Rory McIlroy shot a 7-under 65 to move into the second-round lead at the BMW PGA Championship in Virginia Water, England.
So good was McIlroy’s bogey-free round at Wentworth that playing partner Alex Noren, the defending champion, called it “the best round I’ve ever seen.”
“I’m about to quit golf, I think,” joked Noren, whose own round of 68 left him five shots off the pace on 7 under par.
McIlroy made seven birdies, including four straight from No. 12. Like in the first round, he failed to pick up any shots on the final two holes — both par 5s — but the four-time major winner still described his play as up there with his best in 2018 “ball-striking-wise.”
“I had everything sort of firing today,” said the former top-ranked player, who matched his career-low score at Wentworth although the previous 65 was in 2009 before the course changes the following year.
At 12 under, McIlroy led by three shots over Englishman Sam Horsfield, who followed up a 67 with a 68. European No. 1 Tommy Fleetwood is a shot further back after a 66. final minute of their 98-94 Game 5 victory Thursday night — even though they could offer no more hope for a Game 7 return, should the Golden State Warriors extend the series, than that he will be re-evaluated when the Rockets get back from the Bay.
There was not any reason to think Paul could go from limping to playing quickly.
“It’s tough,” Rockets guard James Harden said. “We don’t want to just be down on it. We want to keep our same swag, our same positive energy. We want to feed it off to him as well. Be happy. Be ready. Get this thing right. Get this thing going. Be back in no time.
“We’re not here to be down and moping around and sad. We’re good. I went over to his spot to like 2:30 in the morning just talking, just chopping it up, laughing and talking about life.”
The challenge of dethroning the Warriors, expected to bring their best with a 3-2 deficit, was already great enough. Paul’s fingerprints were all over the wins that turned the series around, especially in the second half, when he has averaged 13.2 points on 49 percent shooting in the series. He scored 18 of his 20 points in the second half Thursday before the missed jumper over Quinn Cook that felled him.
With Paul out, Eric Gordon will start as he had in 30 regular-season games filling in for Paul and Harden. Gordon, the NBA Sixth Man of the Year last season and one of three finalists this season, averaged 21.5 points as a starter, 20.9 points when filling in for Paul. Averaging 14.7 points in the series, he has been his best late in games, averaging 5.8 points in 8.3 minutes in the fourth quarters of the series, when he has made 46.2 percent of his 3s, including the winners of the past two games.
The Rockets went 15-9 in games Paul missed this season and 50-8 in games he played. Resilient and even cheerful as they remained determined to be, there was no way to diminish Paul’s importance.
“It’s been like that all year,” Tucker said. “We’ll obviously miss Chris . ... But we got to keep going.
“A player as good as Chris Paul, one of our leaders of our team, obviously it’s going to hurt not to have him. But we’ve been a team all year that’s been resilient to injuries. We’ve had a lot of things happen, but we’ve had different guys step up at different times and keep it going. So, next guy up.”
The next guy after Gordon in the Rockets’ seven-man rotation would be Luc Mbah a Moute, who sat out the past two games after struggling in his comeback from a dislocated right shoulder. He has made 2 of 13 shots in the series. With Gordon in Paul’s role, Gerald Green would probably take Gordon’s spot in the rotation, and Mbah a Moute would be in position to fill the 16 minutes Green has averaged in the series.
“I’m feeling better,” Mbah a Moute said. “It’s weird and hard timing to have an injury the (second-tolast) game of the (regular) season. So it’s been kind of hard. Struggling to get back in rhythm. But I just got to stay with it.”
The challenge, however, will not be in finding players to fit in a rotation bringing just two off the bench. Replacing Paul’s production against a Warriors team facing elimination could be the toughest test of the season.
“He’s practically won us the last two games,” Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni said. “Great opportunity for other guys. We have plenty to choose from. We’ll be ready.
“It’s got to be tough. I can only imagine what he’s feeling right now. But he’ll bounce back from this. We’ll get him back. Hopefully, the team rallies around, ‘Hey, we’ll win one for him and get him back.’ “
With that in mind, the Rockets insisted the disappointment of bad fortune will not beat them. They have come too far to give in — or stop laughing.
“Without a doubt. I don’t have a doubt,” D’Antoni said. “They see the challenge. It’s been a challenge. It is a challenge. Whether CP is there or not, it’s a heck of a challenge, and they’re up to it and look forward to it.”