Rory McIlroy’s hopes of following his Masters victory with another in his next PGA Tour start appear to be over after a four-over-par 75 saw him fall 13 behind new leader Alex Fitzpatrick.
A strong back-nine showing in Friday’s second round had McIlroy entering the weekend at the Truist Championship at Quail Hollow just four behind Sungjae Im and he quickly reduced that to three after crushing a drive down the first and sticking a 169-yard approach shot to three feet.
Another perfect drive set up a short approach to the second and he wedged to six feet but misread the break on the downhill putt and it all seemed to unravel from there. Pulled tee shots on the fourth and sixth holes – both par-3s – resulted in bogeys, and he reached the turn at one-over and needed to pick up ground fast if he was going to get back into the mix.
Instead, he bogeyed four straight holes to start the back nine and though he set up a nine-foot eagle putt on the par-5 15th, his frustrations continued as he had to settle for a birdie and parred the remaining three, dropping to one-under for the tournament.
While the final pairing of Sungjae Im and Tommy Fleetwood were treading water, Alex Fitzpatrick, Kristoffer Reitan and Cameron Young were making moves.
Young is one of the hottest players on the PGA Tour, and he’s showing no signs of letting up.
Seeking to win back-to-back events, Young threatened the course record on Saturday before settling for an eight-under 63, leaving him two shots behind Fitzpatrick who leads at 14-under through 54 holes, one shot ahead of Norwegian Reitan after each shot a 64.
Young, who won last week’s Cadillac Championship at Doral by six strokes, needed to play the final two holes in two-under to break Rory McIlroy’s course-record of 10-under 61, set in 2015.
But his birdie putt on No. 17 stopped inches from the hole and his drive on the 18th settled in pine straw behind a tree, forcing him to punch out and leading to his only bogey of the day.
“I know (the record was) 10-under and I knew I was at nine,” Young said. “But that wasn’t my thought. I was just trying to hit it somewhere right of the hole on 17 and hit a couple good shots on 18. Unfortunately had one of my few bad swings of the day on 18.”
Before that, Young had sent his shot from a fairway bunker 238 yards away to within a few feet of the hole on No. 7 for eagle. He seized that momentum to birdie six of his next nine holes.
Matt Fitzpatrick was one of the favorites to win the Truist Championship — but it turns out little brother Alex is the one to watch this week.
Alex Fitzpatrick, who only earned his PGA TOUR card two weeks ago when he teamed with his brother to win the Zurich Classic, rebounded from his only bogey of the day with a tee shot to 8 feet on the par-3 17th hole for birdie to reach 14 under.
Matt is a former U.S. Open champion who’s currently ranked fourth in the world, and Alex said having his brother to lean on has been invaluable.
“I feel like he’s been and done everything that I want to do in the game — whether that’s Ryder Cup and win majors,” said Alex Fitzpatrick, who tied for ninth last week at Doral. “So having him being around and me being there for all of that, I felt like I got a really good sense of what it takes and what the atmosphere is like.”
Reitan, also a rookie, made some noise at the Masters before going 73-77 over the weekend to finish tied for 41st. He closed Saturday with four birdies over the final six holes to surge into second place.
“Just the opportunity to be near the leaderboard on a Sunday at a PGA TOUR event, you know, rookie season — I’m just over the moon about that,” Reitan said.
Nicolai Højgaard was four shots behind along with second-round leader Sungjae Im, who struggled down the stretch and shot 70.
Im skulled a bunker shot on the 15th hole, and the ball hit a grandstand and rolled back across the green before settling not far from where he began. It was one of two bogeys for the South Korean over the final four holes.
Justin Thomas, J.J. Spaun and Tommy Fleetwood are five shots back.
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