There was nothing special about his round, but Ludwig Oberg was in complete control heading into the final day of The Players Championship.
Oberg shot a 1-under 71 on moving day at TPC Sawgrass to stay atop the PGA Tour’s major event. That ultimately left him with a three-shot lead heading into the final day as Xander Schauffele and the rest of the field fell back.
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If Oberg can pull off a win on Sunday, it would mark the biggest victory of his career to date after years of competing back and forth in golf. The European Ryder Cup star has won twice on tour during his career, most recently at last year’s Genesis Invitational.
The day came a little later than originally planned as police investigated a shooting near the golf course Friday night. The players kicked off as normal, but spectators were kept outside until 9am local time. Once they arrived, they saw a familiar sight: Scotty Scheffler tearing up the golf course.
After two days of hard work, he made the cut on the final hole on Friday, and Scheffler played a more familiar match on Saturday. He had five birdies and soared to 4 under on the leaderboard. While he wasn’t able to win a third Players Championship, he got some games back…or, to hear him tell it, he played exactly the way he needed to.
“When I watch the game, I’m not thinking about winning, I’m thinking about handling things the right way,” Scheffler said after the game. “I tried to stay focused and I thought I did a good job of keeping the right attitude and keeping my head above water to get through a couple of tough rounds. And then I had a good round today… It’s been a good week for me.”
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Rory McIlroy, Scheffler’s two-time winner and reigning Players Champion, struggled. McIlroy struggled in an up-and-down even-par tournament — three birdies, three bogeys — and clearly wasn’t playing with the sharpness he’d hoped for before April.
One of the best rounds of the day — better than Scheffler’s 67 — belonged to PGA Tour rookie Sudarshan Yellamaraju, who was making only his seventh Tour start. Yeramaraju needed three birdies on Friday’s final four holes to advance, then added six more on Saturday.
“The cuts are very important here because from there you never know what you can do on the weekend,” he said after the round. “I want to compete and win and that’s the next step, but it has to start somewhere, so cutting back is a good start.”
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The Players Club has more active days, but not much better nap time. One fan was caught on camera enjoying a quality golf nap:
Players don’t have that luxury. On a day that was largely favorable for scoring for the rest of the field, Oberg, Schauffele and the other leaders failed to take advantage. Oberg shot even par on the front nine and Schauffele shot one over, allowing a few other players to get into the mix. Michael Thorbjornsen, Jacob Bridgeman and the ageless Justin Rose all kept their heads down heading into Sunday’s game, ready to challenge for victory.
One struggling Chaser was Justin Thomas, who opened the day with two 68s and was just three shots off the lead at the start of the day. But a disastrous two-hole stretch — bogeys/triple bogeys on Nos. 5 and 6 — dropped him off the leaderboard.
But with everything happening behind him, Oberg wasn’t slipping. Two holes later, he persisted on the par-5 hole and made the turn for his third eagle of the week. That extended the lead to four shots at the time.
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His only real mistake came on the 18th hole, when he three-putted for bogey. He shot 71 and had a three-stroke lead entering Sunday’s game.
Michael Thorbjornsen also joined the fray. After opening the week with a 74, he shot 5 under in Saturday’s round and improved his 65 on Friday to 10 under to move into second place. If he could somehow get past Oberg and pull out the win, it would be the worst start to a Players Championship title in the history of the event. Cameron Young nearly made the final group, although he hit a double on the 18th hole to drop to 9 under.
But it would take quite a while for Thorbjörnsson or anyone else to actually pull off a comeback win after Oberg’s incredibly solid performance on Moving Day.
