Brian Harman takes Travelers Championship lead
CROMWELL, Conn. — For Bubba Watson more pars would have been a good thing at the U.S. Open, but this week could he be accumulating too many of them?
Watson shot 2-under 68 and picked up only his second bogey at TPC River Highlands during Saturday afternoon's third round of the Travelers Championship. It sounds like a solid day, but with 49 of the 72 players in the field shooting under par, there was lots of movement on the leaderboard.
And one player, Brian Harman, managed to overtake the two-round leader, birdieing the 18th hole to finish at 5-under 65 for the day and 14-under for the tournament.
"It feels good to be back in contention," said Harman, who picked up his first PGA Tour win last year at the John Deere Classic, but missed the U.S. Open cut like Watson.
Graham DeLaet (6-under on Saturday) and Watson sit one shot back at 13-under, and they will play together Sunday as the tournament opted for threesomes, starting at 11:40 a.m., to counter the forecast of rain overnight and into the day.
"I wish I could have had more chances at birdie, more 10-footers," said Watson, who experienced a light rain playing with Harman as the last group out. "It's just one of those things where today my shots did the opposite of what I thought they would do, so it made for longer birdie putts and I just didn't make any. … I'm not mad at all, I just wish I was leading."
How low can you go was the theme during the third round — a sharp contrast to last week's U.S. Open where safe shots and pars were the way to play Chambers Bay.
Brandt Snedeker and Patrick Rodgers each shot low rounds of 7-under, teeing off in the morning, as golfers went into birdie hunting mode. Snedeker, Paul Casey and Zach Johnson are tied for fourth at 11-under.
"It's a completely different mindset then from last week," Snedeker said. "Last week pars were good scores. You try to be patient, not go after too many pins and just kind of pick your spots. Here you have to be aggressive whether it lends itself to it or not because you need to make birdies here to have a chance."
Not everyone enjoyed the conditions, though, with 14 golfers finishing over par for the round, including Keegan Bradley, who shot 1-over and sits 6-under.
"It's just one of those things, one of those weeks," Snedeker said. "It's a great golf course. If you are playing good you can shoot seven-under par, but if you are not playing good it's tough. You can shoot even par or over par – you can put some big numbers up out there.
"It's a great way of testing the guys in a different way than the U.S. Open does."
Despite a host of big names near the top, the odds might be in DeLaet's favor. Six of last nine champions have been first-time winners on the Tour and DeLaet's never finished better than second in 122 events.
"I played well all day – it was just a kind of fun, stress-free round," said DeLaet, who highlighted his round with an eagle on the par-four 15th hole.