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PEBBLE BEACH, California (Ticker) -- A familiar name is atop the leaderboard of the Pebble Beach National Pro-Am.
Vijay Singh had an eagle en route to a 5-under-par 67 Saturday and
moved into a tie with Dudley Hart through three rounds of the $1.08
million event.
Singh also had four birdies and a bogey to go along with his eagle at
the par-5 11th at Spyglass Hills to move to 9-under 216. He matched Jim
Furyk, Nick Watney and Bo Van Pelt for the lowest round of the day.
"I've hit the ball very well from tee to green," Singh said. "I think I
missed two greens today, and the other two days I did the same. So my
ball-striking is pretty good at the moment. Probably that's why I'm
scoring well."
Singh and Hart holds a two-shot lead over Dustin Johnson and Michael Allen, who are at 7-under 209.
A 44-year-old native of Fiji who has 31 career PGA Tour victories,
Singh is seeking his first win since the Arnold Palmer Invitational in
March 2007.
"I'm not going to be really worried about anybody else until probably
the last few holes," Singh said. "If I go out there and play the way I
think I should and the way I feel, I should be OK. I just need to make
some putts tomorrow."
Hart used a strong finished to claim a share of the lead with Singh. He
birdied three of the final four holes, including Nos. 17 and 18, for a
bogey-free 68.
That put Hart in position for his third career victory. He has not won
since the 2000 Honda Classic and has just one top-three finish since
2004.
"I just played kind of solid for three days, and I haven't felt like
I've hit it great, but I hit enough good shots and giving myself enough
opportunities and I putted pretty well for three days," Hart said. "So
obviously that helps."
It's likely the majority of the crowd will be pulling for Hart, who
took off the last six months last year to be with his wife, Suzanne,
who had a softball-sized tumor removed from her lung.
With his wife doing well and being the parent of triplets, Hart joked
that a first-place check could put considerably less strain on his
schedule.
"That would, to be honest, be probably one of the best parts of that,"
he said. "But like I said, there's 18 more holes to go and there's a
lot of work to do and there's a lot of hard shots to hit and putts to
make."
Johnson overcame bogeys at Nos. 2 and 10 with an eagle at the par-4
13th before finishing his round with a birdie at the 18th hole. Allen,
who started the day one shot off the lead, signed for a 1-under 71.
"You know, I actually started pretty bad today," Johnson said. "I had a
really bad bogey on 10. But I holed out on 13, so that helped. Then
just played pretty solid the rest of the way."
Defending champion Phil Mickelson, a three-time winner of this event,
was struggling to stay in contention before he unraveled with an 11 on
the par-5 14th and skied to a 78, falling 14 shots and missing the cut.
Feeling he needed to birdie the hole, Mickelson said he "went after a
drive" and landed in the rough. He tried to lay up with a hybrid club
only to send two shots out of bounds.
"I was at 2-under and the leaders were around 8, and I felt like if I
could make three or four coming in I'd have a chance to win," Mickelson
said. "And I ended up pulling two of them out of bounds and I made an
11. That was basically the cut."
A cluster of six players are three shots back at 6-under 210, including
Steve Lowery, who had one of the more bizarre rounds of the day.
After opening with seven straight pars, Lowery had a bogey, two
double-bogeys and seven birdies in his final 11 holes to finish with a
70.
Tim Herron, the overnight leader, stumbled on the back nine and is in a pack of eight players at 5-under 211.
Reigning British Open champion Padraig Harrington started fast and
finished fast but was staggered by a triple-bogey on the par-5 11th.
His 70 left him in a group of seven players five shots off the lead.
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