This The Sentry, the first tournament of the 2024 season of the PGA Tour, demands from competitors something like a seven-under daily record to at least be within the top ten. This has been the case at least during the first two rounds: after 36 holes the accumulated -13 barely enters the top ten of the classification.
It’s a scoring madness what is being experienced at the Plantation course at Kapalua, even though it is certainly a course that tends to be generous with good play, especially when the wind is not hurricane-like (today Friday it has blown less even than in the first round).
And there is a guy, World Number One for more signs, who not only accepts the challenge and keeps up the demanding pace, but has already climbed to the top of the leaderboard and will start Saturday as the sole leader. Scottie Scheffler (-16), indeed, has signed today a 64, nine under on the day, his best card ever at Kapalua, with that way of his of doing things, that seems to go at a trot and not at a gallop. What a huge player.
And yet the Texan started with a bogey on hole 2 that apparently did not exist, since he missed a putt of just seventy centimeters to save par. Despite this mistake, today he has significantly improved with the putter in his hands, as shown for example by that putt of more than seven meters in which he holed for eagle on hole 5. And yet, he still left good opportunities on the 16 greens in regulation that he has hunted (he has only missed three greens in the first two rounds).
We will never tire of insisting on a determining aspect of his game and it is the ability he has to leave the ball closer to the hole than the vast majority of his rivals. And that, almost every round. Today, without going any further, he has putted for birdie on a dozen occasions from distances that did not exceed five meters. He is a real prodigy. To the aforementioned mistake on hole 2, for example, he responded by practically giving the birdie on the 3… His control of distances and the finesse with which he judges the conditions of each shot is simply beastly.
Right now it is almost impossible to think of another option than to have this player in the fight for victory in the last holes on Sunday. Whether to win or not to do so, is another thing, agreed.
Long before Scheffler finished his round Tyrrell Hatton (-15) had signed a 62, eleven under on the day, to get into the last matches on Saturday, with a seven-under partial for the second nine holes and finishing with eagle on the 18. Needless to say, the Englishman has already earned the label of clear candidate for the weekend. The same as Brendon Todd (-15), Sungjae Im (-15), Chris Kirk (-14), Viktor Hovland (-14), who also finished with eagle on the 18, or Collin Morikawa (-14). In reality, there are more than twenty players within a margin of five strokes from the lead, so the candidates are still legion.
