RBC Heritage final round will be Signature Event model at its best

It has been 1,063 days since Justin Thomas hoisted a trophy on the sun-splashed greens at Southern Hills.

That day, he became a two-time major champion and 15-time PGA Tour winner.

Almost three years later, Thomas, now a 31-year-old with a wife and daughter, is still searching for win No. 16.

After two rounds at this week’s RBC Heritage at Harbour Town Golf Links in Hilton Head, South Carolina, Thomas held a two-shot lead. He tied the course record with a 61 in the first round and played steady golf Friday.

Thomas’ plan to “trust his game” had him enter the weekend holding the lead for the first time since the 2022 Farmers Insurance Open. But it’s a lead he didn’t hold during an up-and-down third round that saw Thomas assessed a one-shot penalty for causing his ball to slightly move in a waste area on the second hold. Thomas was removing some loose impediments near his ball, which is allowed by rule, when he saw his ball shift. He called over an official, and they determined that Thomas’ actions forced the ball to move, so he was docked a stroke.

After the round, Thomas wasn’t irritated about the unfortunate penalty on No. 2. He believes that if he continues playing the way he has all week, that one stroke shouldn’t wind up being a factor in his chase to snap his winless drought.

 “I want to win so bad,” Thomas said Friday. “I’m sick of getting asked. I almost feel like I’m kind of past the point where, fortunately, you all have stopped asking me, which is nice, but I would also prefer to get that over with. I think it’s just something I feel like I did so, so well there for a couple of years, I just let tournaments come to me, and I just trusted in my ability. That’s just really been my key this week: I’m just trying to really trust my game and commit to what I’m doing. I have a lot of faith and confidence in what I can do. So I just need to let it happen.”

Thomas parred that hole and played the next 16 holes in two under, including a closing birdie at the 18th, which brought him to within one shot of 54-hole leader Si Woo Kim, setting up a final round at the RBC Heritage that has all the ingredients the PGA Tour envisioned when it set up a Signature Event model that has been criticized since its inception.

On Sunday at Harbour Town Golf Links, you’ll have a marquee star in Thomas looking to end a winless drought that is approaching three years.

He’ll start one shot back of Kim, a 29-year-old who has four career PGA Tour wins, including a Players Championship. Kim, now the 72nd-ranked player in the world, hasn’t won since the 2023 Sentry and just missed his first Masters in nine years.

Not having a trip to Augusta National sparked something in a player who has been a staple on the PGA Tour since 2015 and believes he can regain his top form.

“I was kind of pressured like [two weeks] before the Masters,” Kim said. “I knew I had played [the Masters] the last eight years. I don’t want to miss it this year, but somehow a lot of pressure on the Texas swing, so I didn’t make it.

“I got so frustrated last week watching the Masters, but somehow I got to move on. So I’m just trying to focus this week.”

Kim fired a seven-under 64 in the second round and backed it up with a 66 on Saturday to take a one-shot lead over Thomas and Andrew Novak.

Novak isn’t a star like Thomas. He hasn’t been a fixture on the PGA Tour for over a decade like Kim.

The 30-year-old has been grinding to capture his first PGA Tour win ever since arriving as a full-time member during the 2021-22 season.

Novak first popped this year at the Farmers Insurance Open, where he played in the final group en route to a third-place finish. That helped him vault into the next chunk of Signature Events, where he carded T13 finishes at Pebble Beach and the Genesis Invitational. Novak found his way into the Arnold Palmer Invitational and this week’s RBC Heritage as a back-filler based on his current FedEx Cup rank.

The North Carolina native, who finished T3 at the Valero Texas Open two weeks ago, knows that summoning his best golf on Sunday to don the tartan jacket will change everything for a lifetime grinder.

“It’s really hard to get in these,” Novak said. “It would be nice to not have to worry about that. There’s a lot of good things that come with the win. That’s part of it. There’s a lot of incentive out here to win. I’m playing for a lot tomorrow. I know it, but I’m excited to do it.”

Lurking just behind Kim, Thomas and Novak is Maverick McNealy (13 under), who just recently broke into the top 10 in the world. McNealy won his first career tournament at the RSM Classic in the fall and is playing the best golf of his PGA Tour career.

Brian Harmam (12 under), Tommy Fleetwood (12 under) and Scottie Scheffler (11 under) will also begin Sunday within striking distance, hoping to mount a furious charge up the leaderboard and steal the trophy.

The PGA Tour created the model to manufacture more leaderboards packed with stars. But they also wanted to give players like Novak, those still trying to climb their way up the Tour ladder, an opportunity to earn entry and stars like Scheffler and Thomas in a more compact field. The hope was that, for the most part, the Signature Events would see players from each level of the Tour battle it out on well-known tracks for an increased purse.

Stars, accomplished pros with big-time wins on their resumes, a potential budding star and a 30-year-old grinder who has played his way into the event, hoping it all comes together in sun-soaked Hilton Head.

There will be a lot on the line for pros from all tiers of the PGA Tour on Sunday at the RBC Heritage. That’s just how the PGA Tour drew it up.