Rahm has big finish for 65 and Bay Hill lead
ORLANDO, FLA. » Jon Rahm started his round strong and ended it even better Thursday, closing eagle-birdie-birdie for a 7-under 65 and a two-shot lead in the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
Not even the brute test of Bay Hill was a match for golf’s hottest player.
“Amazing round of golf,” he said. “I wish all of them were as enjoyable as this one.”
That doesn’t mean it was perfection by any means. Rahm, playing in the afternoon when the greens became a bit more crusty, opened with three straight birdies. He held steady the rest of the way until his big burst at the end allowed him to zoom past Honda Classic winner Chris Kirk and Cameron Young.
He hit only eight fairways. He twice was blocked by trees, one time escaping with par with a 30-foot putt on the 15th hole. But oh, that finish.
Rahm hit 5-iron to 25 feet on the fringe at the par-5 16th and holed it for eagle. On the par-3 17th, he hammered a 7-iron that cleared the bunker and landed in just the right spot to roll out to 2 feet. And on the closing hole, he hit a soft 9-iron to a front pin that settled about 6 feet away.
Kirk is coming off an emotional win nearly eight years in the making. He carried that momentum to seven birdies for a 67 during the morning round. Young also had a 67 in morning conditions that might be as easy as Bay Hill gets all week. They were joined by Kurt Kitayama.
Gunmen threaten Messi, shoot up family-owned supermarket
BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA » Gunmen
threatened Argentine soccer superstar Lionel Messi in a written message left when they opened fire at a supermarket owned by his in-laws in Argentina, police said.
Nobody was injured in the early morning attack, and it was unclear why assailants would target Messi or the Unico supermarket in the country’s third-largest city of Rosario, owned by the family of his wife, Antonella Roccuzzo.
The city’s mayor, Pablo Javkin, went to the supermarket and lashed out at federal authorities over what he called their failure to curb a surge in drug-related violence in Rosario, located about 190 miles northwest of the capital of Buenos Aires.
Djokovic to face Medvedev
DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES » Topranked Novak Djokovic beat Hubert Hurkacz 6-3, 7-5 and will face former No. 1 Daniil Medvedev in the semifinals at the Dubai Championships.
The five-time Dubai champion’s 20th straight victory set the stage for a lastfour match against Medvedev, who defeated Borna Coric 6-3, 6-2 in the nightcap at the hard-court tournament.
Djokovic improved to 15-0 this season and hasn’t lost since dropping the Paris Masters final to Holger Rune last November. He followed that up by winning the ATP Finals title in Turin.
Defending Dubai champion Andrey Rublev will face Alexander Zverev in the other semifinal match.
Rublev advanced by defeating Botic van de Zandschulp 6-3, 7-6 (3). Zverev topped Lorenzo Sonego 7-5, 6-4.
It will be Zverev’s first semifinal since the French Open last June, when he injured his right ankle while playing against Rafael Nadal. He underwent surgery days later to repair torn ligaments.
3-time Olympian Decker retires
Three-time Olympian Brianna Decker announced her retirement from the United States national hockey team on Thursday, ending a career in which she ranks third among American women players in world championship tournament points.
The forward from Wisconsin was a core member of USA Hockey’s next generation of female players, who built on the success of their trail-blazing predecessors. She was a member of the gold medal-winning team at the 2018 Winter Games in South Korea — the U.S.’s second to win a title after the 1998 Nagano Games, when women’s hockey made its Olympic debut.
Decker, 31, also won Olympic silver medals in 2014 and 2022, along with six world championship titles. She made her national team debut with the Under-18 squad in 2008, and competed in her first world championship in 2011.