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The second round of the 2026 St. Jude Championship features some surprising names at the top, headlined by Jordan Spieth who is trying to play his way into the top 50 and next week’s BMW Championship.
Spieth, who entered the week 54th in the FedEx Cup standings, has yet to finish inside the top 10 in a PGA Tour event in 2026, but got off to a fast start at TPC Southwind by grabbing a share of the lead at 5 under on Thursday. He was joined by four others — Jake Knapp, Michael Thorbjornsen, Kurt Kitayama and Michael Kim — on a crowded leaderboard with some top stars lurking close behind.
Tommy Fleetwood, Chris Gotterup, Xander Schauffele and Sam Burns all begin Friday within two shots of the lead, while Scottie Scheffler and Ludvig Åberg lurk three shots back. The stunner of Thursday was Rory McIlroy’s first round 74 that has him in 68th place, and the No. 2 player in the world (and No. 12 player in the FedEx Cup) has serious work to do on Friday to get himself back near red figures, much less in contention.
With there being no cut in Memphis this week, Friday is all about positioning for the weekend, as the top players will try to stay attached to the lead and prevent someone from running ahead to grab control of the tournament.
Watch Rounds 3-4 of the 2026 St. Jude Championship live from 3-6 p.m. ET this weekend on CBS, CBSSports.com, Paramount+ and the CBS Sports App. Keep it locked here for live scores, statistics, analysis and highlights throughout Round 2 on Friday.