Live leaderboard: Round 2 of 3M Open

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Rory McIlroy raised his hands slowly as he was approached by a small throng of reporters waiting at the front steps of the TPC Sawgrass clubhouse for reaction to the cancellation of THE PLAYERS Championship. “Not too close,â€� he said with a hint of nervous humor, but also just enough seriousness as the group closed in to create a six-foot buffer. Related: Commissioner Monahan explains PLAYERS cancellation, discusses future | TOUR statement on cancellations The defending PLAYERS Champion will carry that title another year as the PGA TOUR cancelled TPC PLAYERS prior to the second round, as well as the upcoming Valspar Championship (March 19-22), World Golf Championships – Dell Technologies Match Play (March 25-29), Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship (March 26-29) and Valero Texas Open (April 2-5). Augusta National also announced the Masters (April 9-12) will be postponed, meaning the PGA TOUR is on competitive hiatus until, at least the RBC Heritage, which currently due to start on April 16. “It’s the right decision,â€� McIlroy said. “A hundred percent. If in a few weeks’ time this dies down and everything is okay, it’s still the right decision. The regining FedExCup champion wasn’t alone in his positive reaction to the decision. “This is obviously a very serious deal, and I think it’s only going to get worse right now, so it’s best for us not to be playing golf. The main deal right now is for everybody to be safe,â€� U.S. Open champion Gary Woodland said. “We had to do it. It would have looked horrible if we showed up and played today with every other sports leagues not playing. It probably would have been insensitive, so I’m glad the commissioner made the decision that he did. It’s best for us. It’s best for the fans and our families. Hopefully the world comes together and we get over this. This is a very serious deal.â€� Jack Nicklaus, who hosts the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide in early June, was quick to praise the move. “This has been a day and week of incredible concern, confusion and frustration throughout the sporting world, and, more important, our world in general. But as it relates to sport, I applaud the decisions made and the actions taken by all the sporting organizations and ruling bodies, and we hope they produce the intended result, which is simply to keep people safe and not expose them to significant health risks,â€� Nicklaus said via a statement. “As an enormous sports fan myself, I hope the passionate fan bases behind every sport are able to pause, take a step back, and reflect on the importance behind the decisions made. Until this COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic is resolved and until things resume with some normalcy, my friends, please be safe, be smart and stay healthy.â€� Jon Rahm, who originally was on board to keep playing, said he realized the cautionary action was the right move as he read and heard more about the virus. “There’s bigger problem on our hands. People are getting affected; people are having problems. Like I’ve said many times, I’m pretty scared because there’s quite a bit of people in my family with asthma, and my 85-year-old grandma being one of them, which is a direct target,â€� he said. “And there’s nothing I can do because I can’t go home, I can’t come back. All we can all try to do is resume our lives as normal and try to be as clean as possible, wash our hands. I’ve been up since early in the morning, and I can’t believe how many times I’ve washed my hands already and I haven’t left my room. I’m just trying to be clean and do our part as citizens to improve this.â€� Austria’s Bernd Wiesberger was due to get on the last Austrian Airlines flight back to Vienna on Friday afternoon before travel bans start to take effect. He had made the decision to get the flight even before the Masters announced a postponement, knowing he may miss it as a result. He intended to do grocery shopping and other tasks for his mother and grandmother so they did not need to be put at unnecessary risk. “I think it’s the right move, what Jay Monahan and the PGA TOUR have done going forward. Obviously everyone here would have loved to see some golf, but in the bigger picture I’m in constant contact with family and relatives in Europe, and it’s pretty bad there,â€� Wiesberger added. “I’m looking forward to going back home and being with them and help out over there… but it’s unprecedented times. We all need to kind of stick together and do the right thing for everyone, for the elderly, to not have anyone affected that doesn’t need to be, and therefore I think it’s good we’re packing up today and kind of going home and try to have as minimal a social contact as possible and try not to spread it any further.â€� Zach Johnson said it was a chance for everyone to take stock. “I didn’t sleep well last night, but it wasn’t because I wasn’t competing. I didn’t sleep last night because it’s just the unfortunate scenario we’re in,â€� Johnson said. “I think obviously it’s a time to reflect and just really understand, it’s just golf. It’s just golf. It’s just a sport. So it pales in comparison to what we could be combating at some point.â€� With no concrete return date, given the ever-changing situation across the globe, there was uncertainty from players as to how they would spend the next few weeks. Most said they’d focus on their loved ones while trying to remain relatively sharp with a little practice. Others, including Jason Day, said they’d use it as recovery time from nagging injuries. “We’ll go home and relax a little bit, take this as a little bit of a mini offseason in a way,â€� Rickie Fowler said. “But the biggest thing is obviously we don’t want this to turn into something bigger than what it is and what it can be.â€� “This is one of these things where we just have to wait and see. It’s so uncertain, you’re obviously going to still keep playing golf, but you’re going out there practicing not knowing what you’re practicing for,â€� McIlroy added. “I was supposed to have my coach, Michael Bannon, fly out next week and we were going to spend some time together, and that’s probably not going to happen, him coming from Ireland. Probably have time just to spend some time at home, evaluate the situation, and see where we go.â€� In terms of when players expected they’d feel comfortable to return to tournament golf, McIlroy mirrored most when he said he’d be guided by the health experts. “Whenever the powers that be say it’s safe to do so,â€� McIlroy said of a return date. “All you can do is follow the guidelines from the CDC and from the people that really know about this thing.â€� For more on the coronavirus disease, please visit the Center for Disease Control’s information page.

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JERSEY CITY, N.J. – Is this the greatest U.S. golf team ever assembled? Answering that question requires comparing the present to the past. It’s also missing the point. The focus on this week’s outcome at Liberty National, in which the Americans dominated the Internationals so thoroughly that Sunday’s Singles were essentially rendered obsolete, should be spun toward the future. The question is not how good they are, but how much better they can be. Thanks to a nucleus of 20-something stars, a dynamic chemistry, well-timed and collective form, and a leadership group that finally found a winning and sustainable playbook, the U.S. has become, in Nick Price’s words, “a juggernaut.â€� It played out to a 19-11 win, the most lopsided in Presidents Cup history in 17 years. After three stints as the International Captain, Price doesn’t plan to return for a fourth at Royal Melbourne in 2019. That means he’s no longer the primary person tasked with figuring out how to beat the Americans. That will be left up to guys such as Ernie Els and Geoff Ogilvy, assistants this year who are being groomed for future captaincies. It also will be left up to their European Ryder Cup counterparts, who no doubt received the Americans’ message loud and clear this week: We’re here and we’re ready to conquer the world, starting with Paris and Melbourne the next two years. The Americans, in fact, were already letting their minds drift toward the future even before the completion of this week’s event. Thanks to the commanding 11-point lead built after Saturday’s two team sessions, they arrived at Liberty National on Sunday needing just one point from the 12 Singles matches. Phil Mickelson called it a “stress-free day for us – and that’s just something we’ve never had.â€� By the conclusion of the fourth match – Daniel Berger’s 2 and 1 win over Si Woo Kim – they had clinched. “We kind of knew the inevitable was going to happen today,â€� said Jordan Spieth, “You start to kind of look forward and wonder where this momentum could take us.â€� Far would likely be the operative word here. Consider that Spieth, Berger and Justin Thomas are just 24 years old, born within four months of each other in 1993. Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed are 27. Rickie Fowler is 29. Provided there are no health injuries and backsteps in their progress, there’s half your American team for the next decade or so. And of course, that doesn’t include the world’s top-ranked player, Dustin Johnson, who’s 33 and in the early stages of his prime. But it’s not just their age, it’s their attitude. As hard as they compete against each other, they pull for each other even more so. It’s why Spieth was among the first to congratulate Thomas on his PGA Championship win two months ago. It’s why Thomas and Fowler were among those waiting patiently until Spieth was done with his lengthy photo obligations following his Open Championship win. It’s why they vacation together. It’s camaraderie, millennial style. “These guys are famous for traveling together and having fun together,â€� said U.S. assistant Davis Love III, who led the Americans to the Ryder Cup victory last year – the first by the U.S. in eight years. “But the thing is they support each other so much. And that was a big message the last couple teams. Get together, support each other and don’t listen to the outside noise — because they talk about the Americans that they don’t care or that they don’t try. “You see these guys in the team room or working hard on the golf course, they’re trying sometimes too hard. And I think they finally figured out how to relax and play. It showed the first couple of days here that they just came out guns blazing. That feeling spilled over to their U.S. teammates – especially the older ones. “We have a dynamic here that is different than I’ve seen,â€� said the 47-year-old Mickelson, making his 23rd U.S. team appearance this week. “These young guys are not only great players, fiercely competitive, but they have a quality that’s taken me decades to acquire — and that is they are genuinely happy for each other’s success. “That type of support amongst each other, even though they are competing against each other, brings about a really special energy and dynamic to this team. I’ve never been a part of a team all these years that’s this talented and gone out and lit the course up like this. … It’s that support from each other that is getting the best out of them because there is no other way to explain this type of performance.â€� It helps, of course, that practically each American seemed to be at or near the top of his game coming into Liberty National. Johnson and Thomas had won FedExCup Playoffs events. Spieth had top 10s in all four events; Matt Kuchar had three. Fowler had a runner-up in Chicago; Kevin Kisner tied for third in Atlanta. Mickelson, Reed, Kevin Chappell and Charley Hoffman each had at least one top-10 in their last six starts. “The timing of their form,â€� noted Els,â€� has been exceptional. And then you look at their talent on the team, it’s pretty exceptional, too.â€� Eleven of the 12 Americans reached the TOUR Championship. If you weren’t aware of that fact – or the identity of the lone hold-out – then Kuchar made it widely known during Sunday’s post-victory team news conference. “Everybody was on great form,â€� Kuchar said. “We had 11 guys in the TOUR Championship; everybody except Phil Mickelson was at East Lake.â€� Before we go any further, it’s important to know that Kuchar was sitting within arm’s length of Mickelson. You should also know that Kuchar may have consumed some victory champagne or other celebratory beverages. “It was like, how many times does it happen that you get 11 out of 12,â€� Kuchar continued. “If it was only for Phil, we would have had 12 of 12, but Phil was not there. So we were one guy short of having an entire team there and if Phil was there, that would have been the whole team. Like how many times does a team ever have that many guys play that well to make the TOUR Championship?â€� It wasn’t just form, though. It was an incredibly display of big shots, whether holing out from the bunker or rolling in lengthy putts. The Internationals actually played well in the early part of most matches this week, but the Americans were able to turn so many of them down the stretch. U.S. assistant Tiger Woods, who knows a thing or two about the big moments, was impressed with his team’s work on the greens. “I think this was one of the best putting teams I’ve ever seen,â€� Woods said. “I know that they are young, they are talented, hit the ball a long way, but in the end, look at how many more putts we made. Probably from 15 to 18, it was pretty impressive to watch.â€� In the end, the Internationals had no chance. It was the perfect storm, a confluence of variables that worked in the Americans’ favor. Now the challenge is to make sure it’s sustainable. Youth is definitely on the Americans’ side. Chemistry, always a delicate thing, doesn’t seem to be a problem at the moment. But now they wear the target. The Internationals will spend the next two years working on a response. Before that, the Americans have a date in Paris next year; it’s been 25 years since they’ve won on European soil. The best golf team America’s ever assembled? Argue if you must. But you get the feeling their story is just beginning.

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PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — Sergio Garcia rushed to the first tee and raced to the finish line Thursday in THE PLAYERS Championship. RELATED: Leaderboard | Mickelson sees positives at THE PLAYERS Most importantly, he avoided the kind of wreck that allowed TPC Sawgrass to live up to its reputation as the course where anything can happen to anyone at any time. Garcia thought he had plenty of time to get from the range to the 10th tee to start his round. The sun was in his eyes when he looked at the clock, he wasn’t sure what he saw, jogged the rest of the way and had a minute to spare. Then he fired off a 7-under 65, capped off by a birdie-birdie-eagle finish for a two-shot lead over Brian Harman. It was a solid day that became brilliant over the final three holes. Garcia only had to look next to him to see what kind of damage the Stadium Course inflicted, even on a pristine day of pleasant sunshine and a mild breeze. Rory McIlroy, the defending champion, opened with a double bogey from the trees. He hit two in the water on the 18th and made a quadruple-bogey 8. He wound up with a 79, his worst score since his opening round at Royal Portrush in the 2019 Open Championship. When darkness brought the first round to a halt — 21 players didn’t finish — there already were 13 scores of 80 or higher. That included Henrik Stenson with an 85, his highest score ever on the PGA TOUR. There were 22 scores of triple bogey or worse. Garcia took eight shots to play his final three holes. Byeong Hun An took 11 shots on the par-3 17th hole. The Spaniard feels comfortable on a course that causes anxiety even in good weather. “For some reason, it just kind of fits my eye,” said Garcia, who won THE PLAYERS in 2008 and has twice been runner-up. “I see what I want to do pretty much every hole, and then it’s a matter of doing it.” Harman played in the afternoon and was hanging around par until he began the back nine with three straight birdies, shot 31 on the back and wound up with a 67. The Open champion Shane Lowry took bogey on his final hole for a 68 and was tied with Corey Conners and Matt Fitzpatrick. Bryson DeChambeau, coming off his victory last week at Bay Hill, had to take a little off his driver on the par-5 16th and had 9-iron left, setting up a birdie-birdie-par finish to join the group at 69. The small number of fans — by Sawgrass standards — saw a little bit of everything. It started early with McIlroy, who shot 43 on his opening nine holes. “The big number on 18 didn’t help and then doubling the first wasn’t helpful, either,” he said. “It’s hard to recover when you just haven’t played good. If you take that 18th hole out, it still wasn’t a very good day.” Stenson hit into the water on consecutive holes for a double bogey and a triple bogey. He put two more in the water, including one of 18 balls in the water on the island-green 17th. Ian Poulter (77) sat for lunch with McIlroy, Stenson and Tyrrell Hatton (76) and posted video of this fearsome foursome that combined to go 29-over par. “Oh, what a bunch of muppets,” Poulter said. Rickie Fowler, the 2015 champion, had three double bogeys in his round of 77, leaving him in danger of missing the cut. Dustin Johnson took double bogey on the par-5 11th and eagle on the par-5 16th in his round of 73. Jordan Spieth missed only two fairways and had to settle for a 70. Garcia’s lone bogey came after perhaps his best shot. From the pine straw next to a tree left of the first fairway, he hooked an iron that came out low and right to left with enough run that it settled 25 feet away. And then he three-putted. The most remarkable round might have belonged to Hoge, who managed to get through 18 holes without a bogey. “It was a good, solid day, kind of what you want here on the Stadium Course,” Hoge said. “I haven’t been hitting it that well coming in here, so I just tried to hit a lot of greens and stay out of trouble for the most part.” Sebastian Munoz was at 4 under with one hole to play, that being the 18th, and a shot into the water led to a triple bogey for a 71. He tried to take out the positives of five birdies, and that’s what makes this tournament so tough to predict. There are plenty of birdies available. It doesn’t take much to erase all the good work. “You do have a lot of wedges in your hand,” Munoz said. “Par 5s are reachable. So yeah, we do have a lot more chances than a usual course. But I mean, danger is around the corner on every hole.”

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