How to watch the Travelers Championship, Round 3: Featured Groups, live scores, tee times, TV times

ST. AUGUSTINE, Florida – Gary Bullard, a skinny African American golfer in a white Army cap, tried to soak it all in as he birdied the 18th hole at the Advocates Pro Golf Association Tour event at the Slammer & Squire course in World Golf Village on Friday. MORE ON APGA TOUR: Dent following in father’s footsteps | College star sees APGA as key to next level A rising sophomore on West Point Academy men’s golf team, Bullard, 19, shot 75-73 and reports for training at 6 a.m. next Thursday. He won’t touch his clubs for nearly a month. “I won’t have this, and I’ll miss it,” said Bullard, one of a handful of amateurs in the field. “The caliber of players out here is so high, it makes me wonder: Why are these guys not on TOUR? The only difference is the number of people around.” Indeed, the quality of golf at this two-day tournament on the APGA Tour, which promotes diversity by providing playing opportunities for aspiring touring professionals, was first rate. Patrick Newcomb of Benton, Kentucky, shot 65-64 to force a playoff with Julian Suri (62-67), a Jacksonville-based on-and-off TOUR pro. Suri won. Tim O’Neal (64-67) of Savannah, Georgia, finished alone in third, two shots back. An American with both Indian and Mexican heritage who reached a high of 60th in the world, Suri has seen his career stall with injuries. Perhaps this will be a springboard in his comeback. For Kamaiu Johnson (69-67, T6) and Willie Mack III (71-67, T10), both of whom landed sponsorships from Farmers earlier this year – Rickie Fowler tweeted his congratulations – the tournament was just more seasoning. Others, having finished well back, were just soaking it in. That part – being around others in the game, getting mentorship and cell numbers, networking – is not inconsequential. The APGA will increase its number of tournaments to 10 by 2022. It is expected to reach 2,000 young people a year, and develop a database of qualified minority candidates upon which golf organizations and manufactures will be able to draw. Whether or not West Point’s Bullard winds up playing on TOUR after college and his five-year military commitment, he wants to remain in the game. Maybe he’ll work for the TOUR, instead. “The goal is to stay around something you love,” said Bullard, who after signing his card joined fellow competitors for pictures and socializing on the clubhouse veranda. “There’s nothing I love more than golf. I’ve been around it my whole life.” Nearby, Michael Herrera of Moreno Valley, California, about an hour east of Los Angeles, rested his legs after posting a second-round 74 to go with his opening 75. Asked about the logo on his cap and shirt, he spoke of Mike Love Golf & Training (mikeloveapparel.com), his new side project, which after launching sold 35 hats in just a week and a half. “I love the golf business,” said Herrera, 22, “and I’m hoping this one that I’m starting helps me with travel and tournament entry fees to chase the dream. I signed up for Canadian Q school this year, but it got cancelled. I just play and practice as much as I can.” The Slammer & Squire event marked the APGA’s second tournament back since the pandemic, and the circuit will quickly move to its third, at Dubsdread Golf Course in Orlando, Monday and Tuesday. Then comes the Midwest swing – Chicago Harborside International – before the circuit concludes its season with a pair of Southern California tournaments Aug. 30-Sept 2. “Everything has just been so compressed since the break,” said Adrian Sills, who played the PGA TOUR in the 80s and started the APGA with Ken Bentley in 2010. When Sills played the TOUR there were more African Americans than there are now, and he and Bentley are trying to do something about that. So is the PGA TOUR itself, which began to support the APGA in 2012 with access to TPC courses and the PGA TOUR Performance Center at TPC Sawgrass. “Some of these guys like Kamaiu and Willie are right on the verge of breaking out,” Bentley said in an extensive interview with the PGA TOUR last month. And they don’t lack for inspiration; TOUR pros Joseph Bramlett, Harold Varner III and Tony Finau have played in APGA events. “Golf has to change, but I’m optimistic,” Bentley added. He isn’t the only one. For the APGA, it was on to Orlando.

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GREENSBORO, N.C. – Geoff Ogilvy’s season, and his TOUR card, were in danger. It was enough to inspire a clutch performance in the second round of the Wyndham Championship. He birdied five of his final seven holes Friday to shoot 66 and keep his FedExCup Playoffs hopes alive. He stands at 4-under 136 (70-66). Ogilvy, 40, owns eight PGA TOUR victories, including a major and three World Golf Championships, but he arrived at the Wyndham Championship clinging to the final spot in the postseason. He was just seven FedExCup points ahead of No. 126 Cameron Tringale; the top 125 earn spots in next week’s THE NORTHERN TRUST. A missed cut would’ve led to, “a pretty depressing plane ride home,â€� Ogilvy said. He likely would have missed the Playoffs and lost his full PGA TOUR status if he failed to make the weekend. That early departure seemed likely after he made bogey on Sedgefield Country Club’s second hole, his 11th of the day. It dropped him to 1 over par, four or five shots outside of the projected cut line with just seven holes remaining. The pressure induced his best play. “It was do it or go home,â€� Ogilvy said. “If I’m playing OK, I play better when there’s a bit of pressure.â€� His rally started with a 16-foot birdie putt at the third hole. He birdied the next three holes, as well. A fortuitous bounce off a cart path left him with just a pitching wedge into the par-5 fifth hole. He stuck his 102-yard approach shot at the eighth hole to 2 feet for another birdie before parring his final hole of the day. “It’s nice to feel it. Only people who play out here understand that coming down the last few holes on Friday for the cut line is almost as hard as coming down the last few holes Sunday,â€� said Ogilvy the 2006 U.S. Open champion. “It’s different. It’s nerves on a Sunday, but pressure on a Friday. You feel uncomfortable. I have two more cracks at it.” BACK AGAINST THE WALL There are two par-5s at Sedgefield Country Club. Johnson Wagner needed just five shots to play them Friday. An albatross and an eagle helped Wagner shoot 64 on Friday and vault into contention. “It was incredible,â€� Wagner said. “I was kind of struggling early, making some pars and just hit a perfect shot. … I was lucky today.â€� At No. 141 in the FedExCup, Wagner estimates that he needs a top-10 finish to crack the top 125 in the standings. He’ll enter the weekend three shots behind leader Henrik Stenson. Wagner used a 5-iron to hole his second shot on Sedgefield Country Club’s par-5 fifth hole. He eagled the other par-5, No. 15, when he hit a 3-iron to 29 feet and made the putt. Wagner has three albatrosses in competition (two on the PGA TOUR and one on the Web.com Tour), but does not have a hole-in-one in a tournament. Wagner is accustomed to this position. This is the fifth consecutive season he’s been outside the top 125 in the FedExCup standings after July 1. He’s kept his card in three of the previous four seasons. Eight of his 11 top-10s in the previous five seasons have come after July 1. “I like to make it really hard and challenging on myself,â€� Wagner said. “I like to be outside the number at the end of the year and have to play my best golf coming down the stretch.â€� WHAT AN HONOR Arnold Palmer’s alma mater, Wake Forest University, is just 35 minutes from Sedgefield Country Club, a course that he played during his historic PGA TOUR career. Palmer was honored Tuesday with a plaque on the Wall of Champions that sits behind Sedgefield’s ninth green. Palmer’s grandson, Sam Saunders, took part in Tuesday’s ceremony. Then he got to work. Saunders started the Wyndham Championship at No. 127 in the FedExCup. He’s trying to qualify for the FedExCup Playoffs for the first time in his career. He’s off to a good start in that quest. Saunders, 30, followed Thursday’s 63 with a 2-under 68 on Friday. He’s missed just five greens in two days. He’s not thinking about a Playoffs berth and his PGA TOUR card, though. “The objective is to try to win a golf tournament,â€� Saunders said. His best PGA TOUR finish is a runner-up at the 2015 Puerto Rico Open, where he lost in a playoff.

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