Hayden Buckley at Q College on Friday.
Getty Pictures
If the agonizing stress of battling for 5 valuable PGA Tour playing cards wasn’t sufficient, chilly and wind descended on North Florida on Friday, sending all the pieces sideways on the remaining stage of Korn Ferry Tour Q-College — all the pieces together with, apparently, an entire bunch of golf balls.
The fundamentals from this weekend’s Q-College are as follows: 171 gamers are competing for 5 PGA Tour playing cards and there are 40 further spots for Korn Ferry Tour standing up for grabs after that. There are journeymen PGA Tour professionals and KFT professionals with safe standing who’re right here taking a “free roll” and chasing a type of 5 playing cards to get standing on the massive tour. There are children chasing standing for the primary time. And there are dozens and dozens and dozens of gifted professionals with various ranges of standing in between.
Given the sector, then, it was considerably surprising to see the scores that got here by means of on Friday throughout two Ponte Vedra Seaside-area programs.
-The 36-hole lead settled at three beneath par
-Simply eight gamers had been beneath par by means of two rounds
-The primary-round chief adopted his 61 with a 76
-The Dye’s Valley course averaged greater than two-and-a-half photographs over par
-Sawgrass Nation Membership averaged greater than 5 strokes over par and didn’t yield a single under-par spherical
As Saturday’s spherical begins there’s a three-way tie for the lead between Alistair Docherty, Corey Shaun and Matthew Riedel.
The chase for that fifth spot is heated, too: 4 gamers are T5 at one beneath par together with PGA Tour mainstay Lanto Griffin.
There’s additionally a logjam round that top-40 quantity: two over par is T23, which sounds safely in, however 4 over par places you in T52. Play laborious, fellas!
There are some notable names on the fitting and fallacious aspect of these numbers, together with PGA Tour acquainted faces Hayden Buckley, Matt NeSmith and Richy Werenski (all T9 at even par), Nick Watney and Austin Cook dinner (T15 at one over) all the way in which down by means of Doc Redman (T33, three over), Alejandro Tosti (T65, 5 over), Scott Piercy (T79, six over), Justin Suh (T99, seven over), Chez Reavie (T112, eight over), Sam Bennett (T135, 10 over) and lots extra. Most have some assured standing for 2025, however their presence is a reminder of an more and more aggressive high of the PGA Tour panorama.
There are names you’ll have by no means heard, too, each participant with a selected dream and a novel story. These weeks grow to be sliding-doors moments, introductions to these tales and previews of who you’ll see at PGA Tour occasions subsequent yr and past.
There’s Corey Shaun, who missed a reduce in Australia by one shot — in any other case he wouldn’t be right here. He opened with 61 and sits T1 regardless of operating into Friday’s circumstances.
Thomas Longbella is chasing a second probability at big-time standing after wrist surgical procedure reduce his promising season quick.
Co-leader Alistair Docherty completed No. 32 on the KFT’s factors listing, simply exterior PGA Tour standing. Now he has one other probability to advance, too.
He’s midway there. The WDs started to trickle in on Friday night; some professionals have already seen the writing on the wall and that writing doesn’t embrace a top-five end. However most will stick it out by means of the weekend. That is their huge probability for an enormous break, in any case. And some well-timed birdies can go a lengthy means.
You possibly can see scores right here. And you may watch the high-stakes motion on Golf Channel on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
