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Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy was one of four players to shoot a round in the 60s on Saturday, carding 68 to vault 44 spots up the leaderboard at the cold and rainy Wells Fargo Championship in TPC Potomac.
He sits tied for sixth at two under, six strokes behind the leader Keegan Bradley.
Bradley sits at eight-under 202 after three rounds to take a two-shot lead into Sunday's final round at TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm. Max Homa is Bradley's immediate threat, two shots back at six-under. Homa shot 71 for his round.
“It was a really, really good – it was a really, really good day,” McIlroy said. “I felt like I could have been a couple lower, I hit the ball great on the front nine there and just didn’t convert any of the chances that I gave myself. But overall I can’t be too disappointed, 2 under out there was a very good score.”
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McIlroy stayed steady as all around him fell on the front nine, shooting nine straight pars. Bogeys at the 10th and 12th holes were quickly recovered with birdies at the 12th and 14th holes. A great finish with two irons shots hit inside 10 feet set up birdies on the 17th and 18th holes to post a two-under 68.
Jason Day, who led after each of the first two rounds, struggled through a 79 Saturday to fall 12 spots in a tie for 13th at 1-under for the tournament.
The scoring average Saturday was 73.7, with Day helping to inflate that number.
Day went bogey, triple-bogey, bogey from holes three to five on a nightmare day.
Collated third round scores & totals in the PGA Tour Wells Fargo Championship, TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm:
(USA unless stated, Par 70):
202 Keegan Bradley 70 65 67
204 Max Homa 67 66 71
206 Anirban Lahiri (Ind) 68 68 70, James Hahn 66 68 72
207 Matthew Fitzpatrick (Eng) 68 68 71
208 Brian Harman 69 66 73, Cameron Young 68 71 69, Chad Ramey 69 66 73, Denny McCarthy 65 69 74, Luke List 68 66 74, Matthew Wolff 65 73 70, Rory McIlroy (NIrl) 67 73 68
209 Chengtsung Pan (Tai) 68 71 70, Jason Day (Aus) 63 67 79, Jhonattan Vegas (Ven) 68 69 72, Kyoung-Hoon Lee (Kor) 66 73 70, Nick Taylor (Can) 67 73 69, Si Woo Kim (Kor) 67 72 70
210 Adam Schenk 69 68 73, Corey Conners (Can) 69 71 70, Kurt Kitayama 67 67 76, Lanto Griffin 70 69 71, Turk Pettit 67 72 71
211 Hank Lebioda 68 70 73, J. T. Poston 68 69 74, Mackenzie Hughes (Can) 66 73 72, Michael Gligic (Can) 71 69 71, Scott Piercy 67 71 73, Stephan Jaeger (Ger) 67 71 73, Troy Merritt 71 69 71
212 Austin Smotherman 68 71 73, Chez Reavie 69 71 72, David Lingmerth (Swe) 71 69 72, Rickie Fowler 66 72 74, Russell Knox (Sco) 68 72 72, Sergio Garcia (Spa) 67 71 74, Tony Finau 69 69 74, Tyrrell Hatton (Eng) 70 66 76
213 Abraham Ancer (Mex) 69 68 76, Camilo Villegas (Col) 69 69 75, Matt Kuchar 67 73 73, Rory Sabbatini (Svk) 67 69 77, Stewart Cink 66 73 74
214 Ben Kohles 67 72 75, Ben Martin 68 70 76, Chase Seiffert 67 73 74, Dylan Frittelli (Rsa) 71 69 74, Henrik Norlander (Swe) 70 69 75, Justin Lower 68 70 76, Kelly Kraft 70 70 74, Luke Donald (Eng) 71 68 75, Matthew NeSmith 67 72 75, Russell Henley 68 72 74
215 Dawie van der Walt (Rsa) 69 70 76, Dylan Wu 66 73 76, Joel Dahmen 64 75 76, Martin Laird (Sco) 70 69 76, Paul Barjon (Fra) 65 74 76, Ryan Armour 72 67 76
216 Brendan Steele 68 70 78, Callum Tarren (Eng) 65 74 77
217 Peter Malnati 67 73 77
218 Kevin Chappell 70 69 79
219 Taylor Moore 69 71 79
222 Michael Thompson 71 69 82
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