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LOS ANGELES — Beware of Scottie Scheffler.
The world’s No. 1 ranked player is not in the lead entering the final round of the U.S. Open on Sunday, but he’s in a dangerous chase position, with less pressure on him than there is on either leaders Rickie Fowler and Wyndham Clark, or Rory Mcllroy, who’s one shot off the lead at Los Angeles Country Club.
Though Fowler and Clark were battling it out in the final pairing Saturday, Scheffler made a dramatic move late in the third round, with a fairway hole-out eagle on the highly difficult par-4 17th hole and a birdie on the 18th to get to 7-under and thrust himself very much into the Sunday conversation.
Scheffler’s round was a weird, roller-coaster affair. He began the day at 5-under and basically was running in place until he fell to 4-under and seven shots back with a bogey on the 16th hole.
Then came the fireworks on 17. Scheffler said he didn’t see the approach shot go in for eagle, but the noise from the crowd told him it did.
Asked if, as a major champion already and having won six times in the past two years, he’ll feel less nervous on Sunday, Scheffler said: “You’re nervous whether or not you’re leading or chasing. I want to win the golf tournament. It doesn’t matter what tournament it is. I’m showing up and I want to play good and I want to win.
“I’m going to be chasing, but it’s not going feel any different. Got to go out there and execute and do the best I can.’’
McIlroy will feel his own pressure on Sunday, carrying the baggage of not having won a major championship since 2014.
“I feel pretty good,’’ McIlroy said after he shot 69 to get to 9-under. “I felt like I played really smart, solid golf. Hit a lot of fairways, hit a lot of greens.
Sort of felt somewhat stress-free out there, if you can ever call golf at a U.S. Open stress free. I feel like I’m in a good spot heading into tomorrow.’’
Asked if his “know-how’’ to win majors will help him, McIlroy said candidly: “I don’t know. It’s been such a long time since I’ve done it. I’m going out there to try to execute a game plan, and I feel like over the last three days I’ve executed that game plan really, really well, and I just need to do that for one more day.’’
Tom Kim looked like he was about to light the course on fire in his third round.
Kim made the turn in 6-under 29, making him the first player in U.S. Open history to open a round with a 29. Then, however, reality set in on the more-difficult back nine. Kim still finished with a 4-under 66 for the round, but he may always wonder how low he could have gone.
When he birdied No. 10, he was 7-under for the first 10 holes before he played the final eight holes in 3-over.
“It definitely did catch my mind once I was 7-under after 10 where, ‘Man, if I can keep this going, have a good finish, I might have a chance to be really close up there on Sunday,’ ’’ Kim said. “But it was a really short thought because I still had the hardest part of the golf course right in front of me. That back nine is really hard.’’
Matthew Fitzpatrick, the defending champion, took a page from Brooks Koepka’s book, revealing that he’s not crazy about LACC, mostly because of the blind shots on the course.
“Yeah, not my cup of tea,’’ Fitzpatrick said. “I just think the golf course is interesting, to be polite. There’s just too many holes for me where you’ve got blind tee shots and then you’ve got fairways that don’t hold the ball. There’s too much slope.
“Some of the tee shots are just … I think they’re a little bit unfair. You hit a good tee shot and end up in the rough by a foot and then you’re hacking it out. Meanwhile, someone has hit it miles offline the other way and they’ve got a shot.’’
Cameron Young’s tee shot on the 10th hole ended up in a golf cart ball holder.
The cart, used by an NBC on-course reporter, was parked unattended on the left side of the fairway.
Young put a tee underneath the cart where his golf ball was and under Rule 15.2a(2) he was entitled to “relief when (the ball) is in or on an immovable obstruction anywhere on the course except on the putting green.’’
Young hit his second shot to behind the green near the grandstand and got up and down for an eventful and bizarre par.
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