LOS ANGELES • Rickie Fowler, aiming to put a season of struggle behind him, fired a nine-under 63 on Saturday to grab a two-stroke lead over Rory McIlroy in the CJ Cup.
He notched his best round in three years, firing nine birdies without a bogey at Las Vegas' Summit Club, which is hosting the event usually held in South Korea owing to the pandemic.
The 32-year-old American won the most recent of his five PGA Tour titles at the 2019 Phoenix Open. Last season he failed to qualify for the FedExCup play-offs for the first time in his 11-year career and he came into the week ranked 128th in the world.
He will have his work cut out for him with low scores abounding at the Summit, where McIlroy capped his bogey-free 62 with a 21-foot eagle at the 18th hole.
"I haven't been there a lot the last couple of years, so it's nice to be back in that position," Fowler said. "It's been a long time coming. It's been a long road, tough times. We're not done."
Northern Ireland's McIlroy was nine off the pace at the start of the third round, but raced up the leaderboard with five birdies in a row from the third to the seventh holes. He added birdies at the ninth, 12th and 14th before his final flourish to end with a 197 total.
"On a course like this you're going to have stretches where you're going to play good golf and hit good shots and maybe just not hole the putts," he said.
"I played an eight-hole stretch yesterday in even par, I made eight pars in row. It was nice to finish with a birdie last night. Then today I played a stretch of golf, played nine holes in six under and all of a sudden you feel a little better about yourself.
"The big thing is I've played the last two days keeping it in the short stuff and I haven't made any bogeys. That's huge."
He was one stroke in front of Mexico's Abraham Ancer (63), American Robert Streb (65) and Australian Adam Scott (67).
England's Tyrrell Hatton (67) and American Keith Mitchell (73), the overnight leader, were tied a further stroke back on 199 and Australian Cameron Smith (67) and England's Ian Poulter (67) were tied on 200 - making it eight players within five shots of Fowler's lead.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
