By Frank Pingue
BROOKLINE, Mass. (Reuters) – U.S. Open co-leaders Collin Morikawa and Joel Dahmen began their third round on Saturday at The Country Club outside Boston where whipping winds have so far made for tough scoring conditions.
With the top three players in the world rankings — Scottie Scheffler, defending champion Jon Rahm and Rory McIlroy — all within two strokes of the lead after the second round, a day of excitement appears in store at the year’s third major.
By the time the co-leaders set off in the final pairing at the par-four first hole, only nine of the 46 golfers on the course were under par on the day as the layout was playing the toughest it has all week.
Morikawa matched the lowest round of the week on Friday with a four-under-par 66 and now tries to put himself in position to win a major in three consecutive years following triumphs at the British Open (2021) and PGA Championship (2020).
Dahmen, a 34-year-old qualifier playing in his third U.S. Open and ninth career major, is one of three players in the field to card multiple scores of 68 or better on the par-70 layout in Brookline.
Among the five golfers who began the day one stroke off the lead are Spaniard Rahm and four-time major winner McIlroy, who arrived at Brookline as the tournament favourite and fresh off a successful title defence in Canada.
Rahm went off in the penultimate group alongside Hayden Buckley and are playing behind the pairing of Northern Irishman McIlroy, who bogeyed the par-three second, and Aaron Wise.
Masters champion Scheffler, looking to become the first player to win multiple majors in a year since Brooks Koepka did it in 2018, began the day two strokes off the lead and cut it in half with a birdie-bogey-birdie start.
Will Zalatoris, who finished runner-up at last month’s PGA Championship, covered the front nine in two-under 33 and was two shots behind the co-leaders.
(Reporting by Frank Pingue; Editing by Ken Ferris)
