Séamus Power will enter the final day in a tie for 19th at the Tournament of Champions in Hawaii.
Power carded a third round 69, his second consecutive bogey free-round to sit on 14-under overall and 12 shots off the leaders Jon Rahm and Cameron Smith.
Rahm fired a 12-under-par 61 on Saturday to storm into a tie with Smith atop the leaderboard.
Rahm matched the best score of his career and tied the course record set earlier in the day by Justin Thomas. Rahm was one- under after six holes before shooting 11-under par on the final 12 holes.
“You get on the birdie train,” Rahm said, “and things like today can happen.”
The splendid performance was only enough to force a tie with Smith, who entered the day with a three-stroke lead. Smith shot a nine-under-par 64 for the second day in a row after shooting an 8-under-par 65 in the opening round.
Rahm praised Smith and said he believed both golfers pushed each other to their best performance in round three.
“We had a fun battle today and I’m guessing tomorrow’s going to be more of the same,” Rahm said. “We’re going to need a lot of birdies to get ahead and get the win.”
Both Smith and Rahm are 26-under par through the first three rounds. They have a five-stroke cushion over Daniel Berger, who sits alone in third place at 21 under.
Next comes a three-way tie for fourth place between Matt Jones, Sungjae Im and Patrick Cantlay, all of whom are 20 under. Jones climbed the leaderboard by shooting an 11-under 62 on Saturday.
Smith said he savoured the competition as he looks to win the tournament.
“It was really good fun out there today,” Smith said. “Obviously playing nice golf helps. But watching Jon was pretty intense there on that back nine, some of the best golf I think I’ve ever seen, definitely some of the best putting.
“So, yeah, one more day. Hopefully we can do much of the same tomorrow and we’ll see what happens.”
Hawaii Collated third round scores & totals in the USPGA Tour Sentry Tournament of Champions, Plantation Course at Kapalua, Hawaii. (USA unless stated, par 73):
193 Jon Rahm (Spa) 66 66 61, Cameron Smith (Aus) 65 64 64
198 Daniel Berger 66 66 66
199 Patrick Cantlay 66 67 66, Sung Jae Im (Kor) 67 67 65, Matt Jones (Aus) 70 67 62
201 Marc Leishman (Aus) 69 67 65
202 Hideki Matsuyama (Jpn) 69 65 68, Justin Thomas 74 67 61
203 Stewart Cink 69 67 67, Cameron Davis (Aus) 69 68 66, Kevin Kisner 69 68 66, Kevin Na 67 68 68
204 Sam Burns 72 64 68, Bryson DeChambeau 69 68 67, Max Homa 72 67 65, Patrick Reed 74 64 66, Xander Schauffele 69 67 68
205 Talor Gooch 68 70 67, Si Woo Kim (Kor) 71 65 69, Collin Morikawa 68 70 67, Séamus Power (Irl) 71 65 69
206 Joel Dahmen 68 69 69, Garrick Higgo (Rsa) 68 69 69
207 Erik van Rooyen (Rsa) 67 70 70
208 Tony Finau 70 69 69, Brooks Koepka 68 68 72, Jordan Spieth 71 69 68
209 Billy Horschel 72 67 70
210 Lucas Herbert (Aus) 69 73 68, Phil Mickelson 71 69 70
211 Harris English 73 70 68, Viktor Hovland (Nor) 69 69 73
212 Abraham Ancer (Mex) 72 69 71, Branden Grace (Rsa) 69 69 74, Kyoung-Hoon Lee (Kor) 72 71 69
213 Lucas Glover 74 69 70
214 Jason Kokrak 72 70 72,
