Harris English held onto his lead in the WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational with a third-round 65 to finish Saturday at 18 under in Memphis.
The five under par round allowed English to maintain a two-stroke advantage over Bryson DeChambeau and Cameron Smith heading into Sunday’s final round.
Rory McIlroy made five birdies and just one bogey on his way to a round of 66 which leaves him at six under par while Shane Lowry is at the same mark after a round of 67.
English has excelled at avoiding mistakes thus far, shooting a bogey-free round on Saturday after making just three total bogeys in his first two rounds when he shot 62 and 65.
“There’s a lot of good players behind me and my goal is just stick to my strategy and execute and whatever happens, happens,” English said. “I can’t control what everybody else is doing. I can’t really put a number out there, but if you play good golf out here, you can shoot seven, eight under. So who knows what it’s going to take, but I’ve got to keep doing what I’m doing and we’ll see where it is after 18.”
DeChambeau tied for the best round Saturday, shooting a 63 to jump five places and put additional pressure on English with 18 holes to go. His day included eight birdies, with five coming on the back nine, along with one bogey.
“I don’t know what it is,” DeChambeau said. “I like the front a lot better, but it’s just worked out really well this week on the last few holes, I guess the back nine. I’ve just got to keep giving myself chances.”
Jordan Spieth jumped 35 positions after matching DeChambeau with a 63. He fired an eagle and six birdies to quiet some concerns about his health. This week is just his second tournament in the past seven weeks. He is now tied for 17th at seven under.
“I’ve just kind of had the same kind of hand thing that’s been an issue before,” Spieth said. “It’s really good this week, I’ve had no issues and don’t plan on having issues, but I just had some – a couple here or there, jammed it a bit and it was kind of affecting my decision-making on how much golf I wanted to play and I think the rest really helped.”
Australia’s Smith stayed within striking distance of the lead with a 65, a day after he tied the PGA Tour record for fewest putts in a round (with 18). He had seven birdies and two bogeys.
“Just to be in the hunt there tomorrow’s a good enough experience in itself,” Smith said. “I feel like I’ve been up there a few times now, I just need to go out there and do what I did the first three days and grind it out.”
Collated third round scores (USA unless stated, Par 70)
192 Harris English 62 65 65
194 Bryson DeChambeau 65 66 63, Cameron Smith (Aus) 67 62 65
196 Abraham Ancer (Mex) 67 62 67
197 Ian Poulter (Eng) 64 66 67, Scottie Scheffler 65 65 67
199 Paul Casey (Eng) 68 66 65, Dustin Johnson 69 65 65, Louis Oosthuizen (Rsa) 67 64 68, Will Zalatoris 66 66 67
200 Daniel Berger 66 67 67, Sam Burns 66 64 70, Tyrrell Hatton (Eng) 67 68 65
201 Billy Horschel 68 67 66, Hideki Matsuyama (Jpn) 68 69 64
202 Ryan Palmer 70 64 68
203 Tony Finau 69 65 69, Sergio Garcia (Spa) 70 68 65, Jason Kokrak 67 68 68, Jordan Spieth 71 69 63, Justin Thomas 67 67 69
204 Shane Lowry (Irl) 68 69 67, Robert MacIntyre (Sco) 69 67 68, Rory McIlroy (NIrl) 72 66 66
205 Corey Conners (Can) 67 69 69, Jim Herman 64 68 73, Garrick Higgo (Rsa) 68 70 67, Marc Leishman (Aus) 65 71 69, Phil Mickelson 69 66 70, Kevin Na 67 71 67, Lee Westwood (Eng) 67 69 69
206 Brooks Koepka 70 69 67, Martin Laird (Sco) 68 69 69, Collin Morikawa 67 71 68, Joaquin Niemann (Chi) 70 68 68, Carlos Ortiz (Mex) 64 69 73, Patrick Reed 68 69 69, Matthew Wolff 64 70 72
207 Patrick Cantlay 71 67 69, Viktor Hovland (Nor) 73 65 69, Sung Jae Im (Kor) 70 70 67, Brad Kennedy (Aus) 67 70 70, Justin Rose (Eng) 69 69 69
208 Cameron Champ 71 72 65, Stewart Cink 68 66 74, Tommy Fleetwood (Eng) 69 70 69, Brian Harman 70 69 69, Max Homa 66 68 74, Wade Ormsby (Aus) 69 71 68, Aaron Rai (Eng) 70 67 71, Webb Simpson 71 65 72, Robert Streb 71 66 71
209 Matthew Fitzpatrick (Eng) 70 72 67, Lucas Herbert (Aus) 69 70 70
210 Lucas Glover 71 73 66, Ryosuke Kinoshita (Jpn) 74 66 70, Kevin Kisner 67 72 71, Adam Scott (Aus) 74 66 70
211 Matt Jones (Aus) 69 68 74, Victor Perez (Fra) 71 69 71
212 Kyoung-Hoon Lee (Kor) 68 74 70, Xander Schauffele 69 73 70
213 Cameron Davis (Aus) 68 72 73
215 Si Woo Kim (Kor) 70 70 75
216 Min-Woo Lee (Aus) 67 75 74
220 Wilco Nienaber (Rsa) 76 72 72
