Johnson turns rough day into one-shot lead
Golfer misses every fairway for the final 13 holes, hangs on
Dustin Johnson went the last three hours over 13 holes without hitting from the fairway and still managed to hang on to the lead Saturday after two rounds at the Tour Championship.
Johnson could at least see his entire golf ball from the first cut on the par-5 18th at East Lake, setting up a two-putt birdie for an even-par 70 and a one-shot lead over Sungjae Im.
The big picture going into the final two rounds is all about opportunity.
As well as Johnson has been playing — two runner-up finishes and an 11-shot victory in his past three starts — there was a chance he could have started with that two-shot lead and created some big separation.
Instead, nine players are separated by five shots heading for the Labor Day finish.
Im, the budding star from
South Korea whose game had gone lukewarm coming out of the threemonth shutdown, birdied three of his last four holes for a 64 and will be in the final group with Johnson.
Xander Schauffele, who won the Tour Championship as a rookie in 2017, ran off three straight birdies late in his round for a 65 and was two shots behind. Another big move came from
PGA champion Collin Morikawa, whose 66 put him in range.
And it took some help from the leading players who stumbled on an East Lake course that punished mistakes.
Johnson has rounds of 67-70, and along with starting at 10 under because of his No. 1 seed, was at 13-under par. He hit only two fairways — the first hole and the fifth, where both times he made par. He still managed a birdie on No. 8 when he chipped in from 40 feet and the final hole, one of the two par 5s at East Lake.
Rory Mcilroy, who managed only two birdies, lost ground at the end with a shot that laser cameras estimated at 85 feet, which didn’t account for how far it sunk to the bottom of the lake. He tried to reach the 18th green from the thick rough just through the fairway, and it topped out into the water. That led to bogey and a 71.
Justin Thomas pulled within one shot until he couldn’t convert birdie chances and then drove so far left on the 18th that he had to pitch out sideways, leading to bogey and a 71. European PGA: American golfer John Catlin takes a two-stroke lead into the final round at the Andalucia Masters.