Collin Morikawa did what he could Saturday to keep pace with Scottie Scheffler, even closing within two shots of the World No. 1.
But when it felt like Morikawa took one step forward, Scheffler took two.
Scheffler birdied four out of the final five holes at East Lake to close out the third round of the Tour Championship five shots ahead of Morikawa and nine ahead of anyone else.
But that’s with starting strokes. Without them, Scheffler would be trailing Morikawa by one.
This is the sixth year of the Tour Championship’s starting strokes format which sees the FedEx Cup standings translated into starting scores for each of the 30 players to advance all the way to the season’s final event. If you want to see how everyone started the week, click here for the full breakdown.
Scottie Scheffler came into the week as the FedEx Cup leader for the third consecutive season and thus started the tournament with a two-stroke lead at 10 under, but he has yet to win the season-finale and FedEx Cup title.
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In fact, in 2022 he held a larger lead (six strokes) over Rory McIlroy but shot 73 in the final round to allow McIlroy to pass him.
This year, it’s Collin Morikawa chasing him and without the starting strokes, it’s a much closer fight. Morikawa and Scheffler are 17 and 16 under for the week without their starting strokes, two shots better than anyone else in the field.
Coincidentally, Morikawa started the week at four under, the same place where McIlroy started his victorious week from in 2022. So anything is really possible. But as we’re all aware, this is a much different Scottie Scheffler than in 2022.
And the leaderboard without starting strokes isn’t completely meaningless. The Official World Golf Ranking will use it to distribute points from this week’s event. So while Scheffler could end up with the FedEx Cup title, and the $25 million that goes with it, while padding his massive lead in the ranking, Morikawa could end up with a bigger bump.
Keep reading below for what the entire Tour Championship leaderboard would look like without starting strokes.
Tour Championship leaderboard without strokes
(Official scores to par)
1. Collin Morikawa, (-17) 196 (-21)
2. Scottie Scheffler, (-16) 197 (-26)
3. Sahith Theegala, (-14) 199 (-17)
4. Adam Scott, (-12) 201 (-15)
5. Wyndham Clark, (-11) 202 (-15)
T6. Sam Burns, (-10) 203 (-14)
Shane Lowry (-13)
T8. Xander Schauffele, (-8) 205 (-16)
Sungjae Im (-11)
Viktor Hovland (-10)
Russell Henley (-10)
Taylor Pendrith (-9)
Justin Thomas (-8)
14. Rory McIlroy, (-7) 206 (-11)
T15. Ludvig Aberg, (-6) 207 (-11)
Matthieu Pavon (-7)
T17. Hideki Matsuyama, (-5) 208 (-12)
Tommy Fleetwood (-6)
Aaron Rai (-5)
T20. Byeong Hun An, (-4) 209 (-6)
Sepp Straka (-5)
T22. Patrick Cantlay, (-3) 210 (-7)
Tony Finau (-6)
Akshay Bhatia (-5)
T25. Robert MacIntyre, (-2) 211 (-4)
Chris Kirk (-2)
T27. Bill Horschel (E)213 (-1)
Christiaan Bezuidenhout (E)
Tom Hoge (E)
30. Keegan Bradley, (+1) 214 (-5)
