SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 Xander Schauffele entered Saturday with a chance at the U.S. Open lead, but poor putting and a pair of double bogeys left him seven strokes behind leader Wyndham Clark.<\/p>\n
Now, tied for sixth place at even par, the two-time major winner and career U.S. Open scoring leader was among the chorus of chasers at Shinnecock Hills saying it was Clark\u2019s tournament to lose.<\/p>\n
Only Arnold Palmer in 1960 has overcome a seven-stroke deficit to win a U.S. Open.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s all in Wyndham\u2019s hands, really,\u201d Schauffele said. \u201cIf he plays a really solid round of golf tomorrow, if he shoots even par or 1 over or 2 over, he\u2019s going to win the golf tournament. That\u2019s how I think it\u2019s going to pan out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schauffele followed a near-flawless 66 on Friday with a 73 on Saturday. He started the third round at 3 under and was only three behind after Clark bogeyed the first hole.<\/p>\n
But Schauffele soon went backward, with bogeys on the third and sixth holes bookending a birdie on five. Things got worse on the back nine, with two double bogeys in a three-hole stretch. <\/p>\n
On 10, Schauffele put his tee shot in the rough, his approach in the sand and rolled his bunker shot off the back of the elevated green. On 12, he three-putted after stops in the rough and a bunker short of the green.<\/p>\n
After sinking a combined 126 feet of putts on Friday, Schauffele made just 47 feet of putts Saturday. His longest was just 6 1\/2 feet.<\/p>\n
Schauffele ranks 48th on the PGA Tour this season in strokes gained putting, 101st in putts per round and 115th in putting average.<\/p>\n
Birdies on 13 and 15 and a sand save for par on 11 salvaged Schauffele\u2019s day. Or, as he described it to reporters afterward, \u201ckind of a long day, U.S. Open day.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was kind of a little bit of everything, to be honest,\u201d Schauffele said. \u201cKind of a slow start. Then had a bad stretch of golf there 10 through 12. I hit a great bunker shot on 11, but could have been worse, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen I was just trying to get back into touch. Wyndham is playing great … and kind of the rest of the herd is trailing by a lot, and I\u2019m one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schauffele plays exceptionally well in the U.S. Open, but hasn\u2019t won the tournament.<\/p>\n
He finished in the top 10 in seven of his nine previous appearances, including a tie for third in 2019, and owns the best scoring average among players with at least 20 rounds. His worst finish was a tie for 14th in 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way this tournament is panning out, if I can \u2014 in my mind, if I can get to 4 or 5 under, that would be all-world,\u201d Schauffele said. \u201cI\u2019m not even sure if that\u2019s possible tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 Xander Schauffele entered Saturday with a chance at the U.S. Open lead, but poor…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55873,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[1750,182,44,913,2424,56,1518,424,1401],"class_list":["post-55872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-xander-schauffele","tag-arnold-palmer","tag-california","tag-golf","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-sports","tag-u-s-open-mens-golf-championships","tag-wyndham-clark","tag-xander-schauffele"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}