Cantlay cruising at Tour Championship
ATLANTA – Patrick Cantlay met his goal in the first round of the Tour Championship on Thursday, and it had nothing to do with the score on his card or the size of his lead.
As the top seed in the FedEx Cup, he started with a two-shot lead over Tony Finau before even hitting a shot. He finished the warm, breezy day at East Lake at 3-under 67 with a two-shot lead over Jon Rahm.
This was all about playing another tournament round.
“I think being in the spot that I'm in, it would be easy to get ahead of yourself and easy to maybe stray from your game plan because you feel like you're ahead,” Cantlay said. “And that's just not helpful, so I'm not going to do that.”
Only four players had a better score, so it was a good day regardless of the format that allows player to start at various points under par depending on their FedEx Cup position.
Rahm began by chipping in for birdie, kept the round from getting away from him with a few key saves – one for bogey, one for par – at the turn, and ran off four birdies over his last seven holes for a 65.
Cantlay, who started at 10-under par, moved to 13 under.
Five shots behind were Bryson DeChambeau and Harris English, and only one of them managed to pick up a little ground on Cantlay while delivering one of the more exciting moments.
That would be English, who was headed in the wrong direction when he stepped to the tee at the par-3 15th over water, the second-toughest hole at East Lake, smashed a 5-iron from 224 yards and watched it drop for a hole-in-one, the first one since the Tour Championship first came to East Lake in 1998.
He followed with two more birdies for a 66, one better than Cantlay on the day, a little closer than when English started.
DeChambeau birdied his last three holes to salvage a 69. He started three shots behind and now is five shots behind, without any reports of unruly behavior outside the ropes.
The subject of name calling was – who else? – English.
One fan following along kept referring to him by another name – Hudson Swafford – which is understandable. English and Swafford were teammates at Georgia, have similar builds, look a little alike. They're even tied in driving distance (81st) on the PGA Tour.
“He thought I was Hudson like half the people out here,” English said. “I think he kind of had a couple beers. … He just couldn't quite tell from 50 yards out who I was.”
Finau, meanwhile, had a 72 and went from two shots behind to seven back.