Davis Riley, Will Gordon share lead at Sanderson Farms Championship

Danielle Kang posted the low score Sunday at 4-under 68 and sprinted away to a 3-shot victory at the season-opening Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions on Sunday.

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Jon Rahm shot a 4-under 66 on Saturday to get into contention at the BMW Championship at Olympia Fields, but all anyone wanted to talk about was the one hole he bogeyed. He forgot to mark his ball before picking it up at the par-4 fifth hole. Penalty: one stroke. "I just hope I don’t lose by one," Rahm said. "I’m just going to say that. I just hope. And if I do, well, very well my fault. It’s as simple as that." How exactly did he forget to mark his ball before picking it up? Well, even Rahm isn't entirely sure. He had hit his approach to just inside 44 feet when, as he describes it, his mind simply went on walkabout. "I was holding my marker in my pocket," he said of the Arizona State poker chip he uses from far away. "Just went at it, and for some reason I just picked up the ball thinking I marked it already. I was thinking of somebody else and something else or somebody - and yeah, I just picked up the ball without marking it, simple as that." He froze upon realizing his mistake, and fessed up to his violation. "Once I replaced it," he said, "took the penalty and moved on." It was Rahm's only bogey of the day on a course that has confounded the best players in the world, and he was especially proud to have shot 66 after such a lapse. "I’m proud of being able to maintain my composure afterwards," he said. "I think the most important shot of the round was that second putt, the six-footer for bogey. Technically, it helped out a lot. I was able to tell myself I was 1 under par through five holes. It’s not easy; the first few holes aren’t playing that easy today. Just more so proud that I was able to pull it off afterwards. "I really can’t give you an explanation," he added. "It’s one of those things that happen in golf. Never thought it would happen in my professional career, but here we are."

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PARAMUS, N.J. – Phil Mickelson has a lot on his plate these days. For one thing: Twitter. He just dove in with an account earlier this week at THE NORTHERN TRUST, where two closing bogeys dropped him out of the lead but still gave him a second straight 68 (6 under) at Ridgewood Country Club. He was within two of early second-round leader Sean O’Hair (69) with the afternoon wave yet to complete their second rounds. At the very least, the solid start promised to give Mickelson something benign to tweet about, which should put his kids at ease about Dad’s leap into the wild, wooly world of social media. “They are nervous (laughter),â€� said Mickelson, who birdied five of his first six holes Friday to jump into the lead. “And they should be, you know, rightfully so, because in time, I will mess up. It’s just my — I always kind of ride the line somewhere. Sometimes I cross it. Sometimes not.â€� On a more serious note, Mickelson is buckling down as he tries to atone for missing the TOUR Championship at East Lake last year. Things were looking good just six months ago. When he picked up his 43rd PGA TOUR win at the World Golf Championships-Mexico Championship in early March, it broke a nearly five-year drought and portended a big season. Or not. Mickelson finished T5 at the Wells Fargo Championship, but otherwise hasn’t really contended. He hit a moving ball at the U.S. Open, finished T24 at The Open Championship, and missed the cut at the PGA Championship. He’s 11th in the FedExCup, and has made more news with his newly announced made-for-TV match against Tiger Woods than with his play. Now, though, Mickelson seems to be on the comeback trail, again, at age 48. A day after he hit just three fairways but saved himself with his putting, he hit nine of the first 10 in the second round. Only a few late misses marred his effort, but he was encouraged. He badly wants to be on the U.S. Ryder Cup team that will try to be the first to win on European soil since 1993, but first he has to prove worthy of a pick from U.S. Captain Jim Furyk. “Yeah, it’s important,â€� said Mickelson, who has been on every U.S. Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup team since 1994, “because this started out to be a great year, and I want to finish it off right. And usually when I have a bit of a lull in the summer, I play well in the Playoffs. So I expect to have a good first two events and try to make it really easy for Captain Furyk.â€� In the process, he’s hoping to knock off one more thing on his to-do list: Finish the season ranked first in Strokes Gained: Putting. He got off to a good start at Ridgewood this week, making over 110 feet of putts in the first round, but knows he’s still got work to do. “I’ve been No. 2 in strokes gained behind Jason Day all year,â€� Mickelson said. “So either I’m going to have a phenomenal putting stretch and get to No. 1, or I’m just going to bend his putter a little bit so he comes back, because it’s been a great putting year.â€� OBSERVATIONS O’HAIR WINNING MIND GAME … Sean O’Hair says he doesn’t really set goals. He says making his way through the FedExCup isn’t the be all and end all. He says being a member at Aronimink in Philadelphia – where the third FedExCup Playoff event, the BMW Championship, will be held Sept. 6-9 – doesn’t burden him with pressure. Nope. Sean O’Hair is just happy to be here after a tough last few months. Believe him or not, but O’Hair has played inspired golf over the opening two rounds of THE NORTHERN TRUST. He backed up his opening 66 with a 2-under 69 to move to 7 under, good enough for the clubhouse lead after the morning wave. “I’m not really much of a goal setter,â€� said O’Hair, who at 121st in the FedExCup likely needs a top-30 or better here to survive to the Dell Technologies Championship at TPC Boston. “It’s always a bonus to get in the TOUR Championship and it’s always a nice way to end the year. “I think every week is just an opportunity,â€� he added. “Every day is an opportunity. And for guys like me, every day is, you know, kind of a do-or-die situation. I actually think that just takes the pressure off. You win one of these events, and all of a sudden, thing change, and if you get in the TOUR Championship and win the TOUR Championship, you have a good chance of winning the FedExCup.â€� While the scoreboards are constantly flashing projections, O’Hair said he is taking no notice. The four-time TOUR winner is just grateful to be in New Jersey and not at the Web.com Finals in Ohio. “The last thing for me that’s going to help me is thinking about what I need to do to get to Aronimink or get to TOUR Championship,â€� he said. “I feel like the last two days have kind of happened because I’m working on the right things, and I’m focused more on maybe the process of the game right now than the actual score and result of it. “This is the end of my 14th season out here, so I’ve done this enough to know that if I go out there trying to get results, whether it be finishing a certain position on FedExCup or win a golf tournament or shoot a score; that just doesn’t work for me. That’s not how I function.â€�

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