Leaderboard: PGA Championship 2nd round

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. – Rickie Fowler was careful not to rush back into action after injuring his right oblique muscle. He’s returned just in time to guard his berth in the TOUR Championship and keep his FedExCup hopes alive.   After sitting out the first two events of the Playoffs, Fowler is 26th in the FedExCup standings with 1,302 points. He’s 97 points ahead of No. 30 Gary Woodland.   “It’s one of the reasons I wanted to try and get back early enough to where we can secure a spot for East Lake. We have some work to do this week and I think, ultimately, I’d like to not just get into East Lake but put myself in a good position to have a chance there,â€� Fowler said.   Fowler has qualified for the TOUR Championship in three of the past four seasons. He missed East Lake by a single shot in the other (2016).   Fowler fell nine spots in the FedExCup standings after sitting out the first two Playoffs events because of the injury that hampered him during the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational and PGA Championship. He finished in the top 20 of both events even though the injury hurt worst at an inopportune time: the middle of his downswing.   “I remember exactly when and where I was, seventh tee, 6-iron at Akron on Saturday and I had felt a little bit of maybe discomfort there leading into it but that was where I really felt it and played through it Saturday there and Sunday and then tried to rest and recover as much as I could going to the PGA,â€� Fowler said.   He shot a first-round 65 at Bellerive and started the final round in third place, just three shots back of Brooks Koepka. Fowler faded to 12th-place with a final-round 71, though.   “I kind of had to go into somewhat protection mode. I was taped up fairly good to help make sure I wasn’t going to stress that area too much,â€� he said. “We managed our way around I felt like the best we could. It was nice to be in the mix but, unfortunately, we didn’t have a hundred percent.â€� Ultimately, I’d like to not just get into East Lake but put myself in a good position to have a chance there. Fowler spent the past three weeks rehabbing the injury with heat, ice and a laser machine. He considered returning at last week’s Dell Technologies Championship until hearing wisdom passed down from Davis Love III, who said, “No one has ever regretted coming back too late.â€�   Fowler still felt discomfort when he tried swinging a club two weeks ago. He played 72 holes last week to simulate an event but didn’t feel he’d have time to adequately prepare for the Dell Technologies Championship.   He has played Aronimink at the 2010 and 2011 Quicken Loans National. He missed the cut in the first year but shared the 54-hole lead a year later after a third-round 64. He faded to 13th with a Sunday 74, finishing eight shots behind the man with whom he’d shared the lead, Nick Watney. Fowler finished a career-best fourth in the 2015 FedExCup. That was the year he won THE PLAYERS Championship and the second event of the FedExCup Playoffs, the Dell Technologies Championship.   He missed the TOUR Championship in 2016 after arriving at Crooked Stick ranked 28th in the FedExCup standings. He finished 59th in the 68-man field to fall to 31st, missing the TOUR Championship by 0.57 points.

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THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — Justin Thomas went from a fast finish one day to a fast start the next, and it carried him to a 7-under 65 on Friday and a one-shot lead in the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP @ SHERWOOD. RELATED: Full leaderboard | Rebound rounds for Tiger and Rory Thomas wasn’t particularly thrilled, except for his position, mainly because the final stretch of holes was still fresh on his mind and he closed with six consecutive pars on a day when the field made birdie or better just over 33% of the time. Richy Werenski led the way with 12 birdies for a 61, the lowest score in a TOUR-sanctioned competition at Sherwood. The average score was 67.87. Tiger Woods managed to beat that, making eight birdies in is round of 66, and he still didn’t pick up any shots against the lead. The defending champion at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP — he won last year in Japan — was still 12 shots behind. "Got off to a much better start and kept rolling," Woods said. Thomas finished late Thursday afternoon with a 29 on the back nine at Sherwood for a 65. He began the second round on the back nine and ran off four straight birdies, chipping in on the par-3 12th, and played it in 31. But after two birdies in three holes to start the front nine — he hit into the water on the par-5 second hole and still managed to escape with par — he didn’t convert any birdie chances. Thomas was at 14-under 130, one stroke clear of Lanto Griffin and Dylan Frittelli, who each had a 65 and each made bogey on the final hole. Griffin tied Thomas with a 5-foot birdie on the seventh hole and then a 5-iron that didn’t turn out the way he had envisioned — he aimed 25 feet left and hit it right at the flag, 15 feet behind it. "Pushed it right at the flag and it lands a foot from the hole," Griffin said. "Then Rickie (Fowler) hit right where I was trying to hit it and his caddie said, ‘Good shot.' And I said, ‘Yeah, that's where I was trying to hit it.’" It worked out fine, but he dropped back with a clunky 9-iron on the ninth hole that came up nearly 30 yards short of the hole and he missed a 10-foot par putt. Patrick Cantlay found his putting touch and and shot 65. He was two shots behind, along with Scottie Scheffler, who also had a 65. Low scores were everywhere on a course that is short by PGA TOUR standards and has five par 5s that are reachable in two, even without hitting driver off the tee. There has been little wind and pleasant weather. And different from the days of the Woods’ holiday event in December, a 78-man field makes it likely more players are going low, especially when they see what everyone else is doing. Woods couldn’t be much worse from Thursday, especially on the par 5s. He played them in 3 over in the opening round of 76, his highest score in his 13th year playing Sherwood. He played them in 4 under on Friday. Phil Mickelson played them in 3 over Friday, but it was really just a couple of par 5s that ate him up. He sent his tee shot off the property to the left on the 11th hole and made bogey. And on the 13th, he sent two shots into what amounts to a jungle left of the fairway and made a quadruple-bogey 9. He shot 74 and was near the bottom of the pack, one week after winning for the second straight time on the PGA TOUR Champions. Making birdies is not a problem for Rory McIlroy. He’s just not getting much out of them. McIlroy made seven birdies in the opening round, but he had three bogeys, two double bogeys and one club snapped over his knee on the back nine. On Friday, he made eight birdies and still only managed a 67. "So I've made 15 birdies in the first two days, which usually would put you right up at the top of the leaderboard. I just made too many mistakes," McIlroy said. "It was the same story last week, sort of the same story at Winged Foot. Just one of those stretches where the good stuff's there, but the bad stuff is sort of taking away from the fact that I'm hitting good shots and making birdies." Thomas has won the last four times he had a 36-hole lead, though this is different. Twenty players were within four shots of the lead, all of them at 10 under or better. He is playing well, making birdies and it was no time to let up. "I played well. I’m not very pleased with the finish," he said. "The last six holes, I would have liked to at least have got something. Having a 5-iron and a 5-wood out of the fairway into two par 5s and making two pars is not good. I just wasn’t near as tight and tidy those last four holes."

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ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. — Harry Higgs lost his full PGA TOUR card toward the end of last season and took a step Friday at Sea Island toward getting it back. Higgs played bogey-free on the more difficult Seaside course for a 7-under 63, giving him a share of the lead with recent Texas grad Cole Hammer and Andrew Putnam going into the weekend of The RSM Classic. Plenty is at stake in the final official PGA TOUR event before a six-week break to end the year. Hammer, who had a 66 at Seaside, is playing on a sponsor exemption and has no full status on any tour. Putnam, whose only PGA TOUR title was in 2018, had a 65 on the Plantation course. He is playing for the eighth time in 10 weeks, having missed only the Butterfield Bermuda Championship in the fall because he’s made every cut — he was a runner-up in Japan — and because the weather isn’t all that great at home near Seattle. Higgs is an everyman, popular among his peers, and it stung to finish last season the way he did. After he tied for 14th in his Masters debut, Higgs missed the cut in 10 of his last 14 events to finish out of the top 125 in the FedExCup. He went to the Korn Ferry Tour Finals and missed the cut in all three of those tournaments. Now he has conditional status, and this presents a great opportunity. Job security can be stressful on the PGA TOUR, especially going into a season in which only 70 will qualify for the lucrative postseason. “It’s in the back of your mind. It always is for almost everybody except for some of the top players in the world,” Higgs said. “But it can motivate you to work a little bit harder, make better decisions. The goal is to not really have to worry about it come March or as early as possible, right?” The leaders were at 12-under 130. Joel Dahmen (64 on Plantation), Beau Hossler (67 on Plantation) and Sahith Theegala, who matched Higgs with a 63 on Seaside, were one shot behind. Dahmen won in the Dominican Republic last year and his exemption runs out after this season. He often rooms with Higgs, so he can appreciate the feeling of playing with the pressure of trying to keep a job. “Golf is very hard and it can go sour quickly. To play with freedom for … two-and-a-half years, really, never had that in my career. So yeah, teeing up in Napa was like, `OK, we’re back at square one. If you don’t play well, you don’t have a job.’ I was very aware of that. “I don’t think about it necessarily when I’m out there, but there’s been a couple extra days of practice, for sure.” The weather wasn’t quite as cold as the opening round, and scoring remained low. The cut was at 4-under 138. Hammer, who made his first PGA TOUR cut as a pro last week in Houston, made bogeys from the fairway on the seventh and eighth holes at Seaside — two of the easier holes for the day — and then turned it around with an approach to 3 feet on No. 9 and then a birdie putt from 18 feet on the next hole. He was bogey-free the rest of the way and will be in the final group on the weekend. “I was a little bit depressed after 7 and 8. I put myself in great position to make birdies and I walked out with two bogeys, and that’s almost inexcusable,” Hammer said. “But coming back firing on 9 and then making a birdie on 10 — erasing those bogeys on two of the tougher holes right away — was huge for momentum and for confidence.”

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