Chappell leads way in Georgia

The 31-year-old from SC started the day with a three shot lead over Kevin Chappell and showed no signs of nerves as he made four birdies on the front nine to take the pressure off. He matched Rickie Fowler shot-for-shot in a three-hole playoff, and Fowler finally prevailed by making his third birdie of the day on the island-green 17th hole at Sawgrass.

Kisner’s second 64 in a row left him on 22-under 260 for 72 holes, with countryman Kevin Chappell second on 266 and Northern Ireland’s Graeme McDowell third on 267.

In the last PGA Tour event of the year, the final putt belonged to a guy who finally got his breakthrough win.

Despite his recent near misses, the leader, who went to college at the nearby University of Georgia, is not thinking of letting up and says he is planning to keep attacking on the final day.

“What I’ve learned is you just can’t hold back on this tour”, Kisner told ESPN after Saturday’s round.

“If I play the way I have since Hilton Head, I feel like a top 20 player”, he said.

McDowell lifted his ball to clean it on the first fairway when he realised for the first time this week the conditions were no longer lift, clean and place – the one-shot penalty gave him par instead of a birdie.

Kisner added an 8-foot par save at the par-5 seventh hole after finding the dunes with his second shot to total 83 feet of putts made for his first nine holes, almost equaling his total for Saturday’s round.

Kerr shot a 4-under 68 and finished at 17-under 271, one shot better than Gerina Piller and Ha Na Jang. And then he was runner-up by two shots to Russell Knox in the HSBC Champions in Shanghai. “Because in my previous four years on tour, I never felt like I had the game to win”.

“Just getting more and more comfortable in that situation”, Kisner said. “I drove the ball great today and had a lot of chances for birdie”. “Just really fought hard and tried to give myself as many opportunities as I could”. When I did finish up near the lead, it was kind of back door, shoot pretty well on Sunday to get up there. “Didn’t play my way out of it, which looked like I could early in the round”.

Alex Cejka had his third straight 67 and at 11-under 201 was the only other player within five shots of Kisner. “I think that should help push me forward to where I want to be”. Fifteen players missed the 54-hole cut, including British Open champion Zach Johnson…. – Davis Love III and Davis Love IV did everything together Thursday at Sea Island.