Live results: WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play

SAN ANTONIO — Brandt Snedeker and Beau Hossler each shot rounds of 5-under 67 to join J.J. Spaun and Dylan Frittelli atop the leaderboard after the third round of the Valero Texas Open on Saturday. RELATED: Leaderboard | Top 10 Valero Texas Opens | Martin sees bigger picture at Valero Texas Open Both Spaun, who shot 69, and Frittelli (70) bogeyed the last hole to finish with a share of the lead at 10-under 206. Another final-hole bogey kept Scott Stallings out of the lead. He also shot 65 and was a shot back at 9-under. Matt Kuchar’s bogey at 18 dropped him to 8-under after an even-par round. Spaun birdied four of his five holes heading to the 18th to take a one-shot lead. At the 17th he drove the green at the 303-yard par-4 and almost made the 19-foot eagle. However, he pushed his tee shot on 18 into the trees, punched out, then laid up short of the stream that guards the final green. He ended up with a 22-foot putt for par that he missed. Second-round leader Ryan Palmer didn’t have a bogey Friday. On Saturday he didn’t have a birdie and dropped to 21st place with a 5-over 77. With a bogey-free round, Snedeker was 4-under on the backside. He is looking for his first win since 2018. It would be his 10th TOUR victory. Spaun and Hossler are each looking for their first TOUR win and Frittelli won in 2019 at the John Deere Classic. Maverick McNealy matched the best round of the day with 65, and he was three shots back with Charles Howell III (72), Si Woo Kim (68), Denny McCarthy (68), Troy Merritt (69), Aaron Rai (68), Brendon Todd (72) and Gary Woodland (72). Hossler had three-straight birdies starting at No. 14 when all of his approach shots finished less than 10 feet from the hole. A pro since 2016 after playing at University of Texas, Hossler has a career-best finish of second in the 2018 Houston Open and was third this year at Pebble Beach. Stallings, a 37-year-old three-time winner on the PGA TOUR, started the day out of the top 20 and got in range of the leaders when a 36-foot birdie dropped at No. 8 to go 7-under. It was his third birdie of the day, and two more at 14 and 15 gave him a share of the lead. A victory would be his first since the 2014 Farmers Insurance Open and would qualify him for the Masters next week. He hasn’t played in Augusta since a missed cut in 2014. Kuchar was two strokes out of the lead entering the day, but he was in a six-way tie for the lead when he walked off the second green after a 4-foot birdie putt. He took the lead with a 16-footer on the next. The lead was two with a birdie from 17 feet on the fourth. But his three-putt inside 40 feet on the fifth soon had him back in a tie. Spaun birdied three of his first six holes and reached 10-under at No. 6. It was the second time this week Spaun reached double digits and was on top of the leaderboard. On Friday, he reached 10-under and bogeyed three of four holes including a lost stroke at No. 9. On Saturday, he double-bogeyed the ninth.

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After entering the weekend in contention at the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba, Carlos Ortiz heads to Houston to defend in one of the PGA TOUR’s longest-running host cities. To win this year’s Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open, however, he’ll have to top a field boasting many of the game’s top players. FIELD NOTES: Brooks Koepka will head back to Houston – and the course he had a hand in shaping – to find his game after some continued struggles saw him miss the cut in Mexico… Koepka is joined by 13 other major champions in the Houston field… Matthew Wolff, who held the 36-hole lead in Mexico, is teeing it up… Past Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open winners teeing it up include the last four champs: Ortiz (defending a TOUR title for the first time), Lanto Griffin, Russell Henley, and Ian Poulter… Texas native and U.S. Ryder cup team member Scottie Scheffler is in the field after sitting in second place halfway through last week’s World Wide Technology Championship… Adam Scott, who won in Houston in 2007, is returning to action after a T5 at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT… Sponsor exemptions include Arizona State senior Cameron Sisk, Houston-area residents MJ Daffue and Shawn Stefani, and Brooks Koepka’s younger brother, Chase Koepka… Sisk earned his spot by winning the Maridoe Intercollegiate. He is 18th in the PGA TOUR University ranking. Sisk has finished in the top 5 in all three of his starts this season, including a win and runner-up. FEDEXCUP: Winner receives 500 FedExCup points. COURSE: Memorial Park Golf Course, par 70, 7,412 yards. This municipal course underwent a dramatic renovation by famed architect Tom Doak, with consultation from Brooks Koepka, before returning to the PGA TOUR after an absence of nearly six decades. To prepare for the TOUR’s return, holes were both shortened and lengthened, and trees were removed. The course boasts strategic bunkering, and unique green contours with dramatic short-grass runoffs – making it a second-shot golf course. STORYLINES: The Houston stop is the penultimate event on the PGA TOUR schedule in 2021… With just one more event left after Houston, this is prime time for many to earn valuable FedExCup points. Sixteen of the top 30 players on the FedExCup standings (as of Nov. 6), including leader Sam Burns, will tee it up in Houston. Three past FedExCup champions (Bill Haas, Brandt Snedeker, and Henrik Stenson) are scheduled to play… Ortiz is looking to become the first golfer to defend his title in Houston since Vijay Singh in 2004-05… While there hasn’t been a playoff in Houston since 2018, the event has still seen playoffs 23 times out of its 74 editions – the second most of any in the TOUR’s history after the U.S. Open. 72-HOLE RECORD: 266, Curtis Strange and Lee Trevino (1980 at Woodlands CC), Vijay Singh (2002 at TPC Woodlands). Golf Club of Houston record: 268, Phil Mickelson (2011), Russell Henley (2017). Memorial Park Golf Course record: 267, Carlos Ortiz (2020) 18-HOLE RECORD: 62, Ron Streck (3rd round, 1981 at Woodlands CC), Fred Funk (3rd round, 1992 at TPC Woodlands). Golf Club of Houston record: 63, Johnson Wagner (1st round, 2008), Adam Scott (1st round, 2008), Jimmy Walker (1st round, 2011), Phil Mickelson (3rd round, 2011), Scott Piercy (1st round, 2015), Sung Kang (2nd round, 2017). Memorial Park Golf Course record: 63, Hideki Matsuyama (4th round, 2020), Talor Gooch (4th round, 2020) LAST TIME: Carlos Ortiz finally broke through to win on the PGA TOUR (after winning three times on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2014) after a final-round 65 in Houston. He became the first Mexican player in 42 years to win on the PGA TOUR. … Dustin Johnson and Hideki Matsuyama tied for second, then went on to win the next two Masters. Johnson won 2020’s unique November Masters the following week and Matsuyama won in the tournament’s return to its traditional April date … Ortiz needed two putts to win on the 72nd hole, but drained a 20-footer for birdie to finish in style. Matsuyama and Johnson finished tied for second, two shots back of Ortiz. Talor Gooch finished fourth, while Brooks Koepka and Sepp Straka rounded out the top five. Koepka had a role in redesigning the tournament’s host layout, the Memorial Park Golf Course. The 2020 Houston Open was the first domestic PGA TOUR event that allowed spectators since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, with 2,000 tickets sold per day. HOW TO FOLLOW Television: Thursday-Sunday, 1 p.m.-4 p.m. ET (Golf Channel). PGA TOUR LIVE: Thursday-Friday, 7:30 a.m.-4 p.m. (Featured Groups) Radio: Thursday-Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday-Sunday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. (PGA TOUR Radio on SiriusXM and PGATOUR.com/liveaudio).

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Two birds, one stone for American Kang

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