By Rahul Banerji
Scottie Scheffler pulled away from the field on Moving Day at the Hero World Challenge, opening a three-shot gap with 18 holes to go at Albany.
The world number one, denied the Tiger Trophy twice in the last two years fired a brilliant 7-under 65 that had two eagles and four birdies to lead Matt Fitzpatrick on 16 under par 200 to the Englishman’s 13-under 203.
Fitzpatrick’s last eight holes had just one par along with an eagle, four birdies, a bogey and a double.
Justin Thomas (68) was third while overnight co-leader Jordan Spieth was shared fourth with first-round co-leader Tony Finau (68), Jason Day (66) and Colling Morikawa (68) at 10-under 206.
Event host Tiger Woods meanwhile, said he was excited at the progress he had made since Thursday.
With his third 71 of the tournament, Tiger was level par 216 and tied 16th with two-time defending champion Viktor Hovland.
“I still have the game,” Woods said later. “It’s whether or not the body can do it. I’m very pleasantly surprised at how I’ve recovered every day. My activations in the gym have been good.
Shedding rust
“I’m very excited at how I have felt physically. Knocking off some rust. I mean, we can always knock off rust at home, but it’s so different come game time.
“To be able to knock off some of the rust as I have this week and showed myself that I can recover each and every day, that was kind of an unknown as far as I’ve walked this far. I’m very excited about how the week’s turned out.
“…Generally as the week progresses my feel for pin high gets better and better every day. I think that’s an indication this week, I know the score doesn’t indicate what I think I could have shot today, but it was definitely clearer than it was yesterday.”
After a bogey-bogey start, Tiger bounced back with birdies at the third, sixth, eighth and ninth holes — where he got up and down from a greenside bunker.
Hot putter
The consistent Scheffler, who had 17 top-10s in 23 PGA Tour starts coming into this week, has been striking the ball well, both off the tee and into the greens and now his putting, too, is picking up.
“I feel as if I’m much clearer in what I need to be working on and a lot of that has to do with how I’m set up over the ball,” Scheffler, who had 28 putts on the day, said.
“When I’m set up in the right position, then I feel like my mechanics are really good. That’s what I’m focused on.
“I played really well today, really solid the whole day. …nice to see some putts go in. These greens can be tough at times but I’m rolling it good.”
Scheffler pulled away with two eagles and four birdies to lead by four strokes before dropping his only shot of the day on 18 after a drive into the rough.
Third round scores
200: Scottie Scheffler (69-66-65)
203: Matt Fitzpatrick (70-68-65)
205: Justin Thomas (70-67-68)
206: Jason Day (71-69-66), Jordan Spieth (68-67-71), Tony Finau (67-71-68), Collin Morikawa (69-69-68)
207: Sepp Straka (72-67-68), Brian Harman (67-69-71)
209: Cameron Young (69-71-69)
211: Justin Rose (72-71-68), Lucas Glover (71-71-69)
213: Max Homa (69-73-71)
214: Keegan Bradley (72-74-68)
215: Sam Burns (71-76-68)
216: Tiger Woods (75-70-71), Viktor Hovland (73-73-70)
217: Rickie Fowler (74-70-73)
220: Wyndham Clark (76-73-71)
228: Will Zalatoris (81-68-79)
Also read: Tiger improves but still trails leaders Scheffler, Speith by yards
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