GREENSBORO, N.C. – Cameron Young did his best to win the Wyndham Championship on Saturday.
He finished off a second-round 62 with two birdies in his final four holes in the morning and then carded four straight birdies on the front nine to build as much as an eight-stroke lead. He cooled off a bit but still shot a third-round 65 at Sedgefield Country Club to improve to 20-under 190 and carry a five-stroke lead over Nico Echavarria into Sunday.
It marks Young’s first 54-hole lead or co-lead on Tour, and equals the largest 54-hole lead in Wyndham Championship history.
Young, who played his college golf at nearby Wake Forest University, is winless on the PGA Tour in 94 starts and has finished runner-up seven times during his career, the most on Tour without a win since 1983. Does he feel like he has a monkey on his back that he’s attempting to rid himself of on Sunday?
“Not really. If you had asked me two years ago I’d probably say yes, but if you go back through, I finished second a bunch, I’ve gotten beat a lot. I’ve played some good golf on Sunday in really all those cases,” he said. “So that’s all I’m trying to do tomorrow. I’m starting in a nice spot, so I’m just looking to try to beat second place by as many as I can. That’s been my mindset from the first tee on Thursday and that’s what I’m going to try to do tomorrow.”
Young, who is 14 under on the front nine this week, is leading the field in Strokes Gained: Putting and scrambling. He’s also second in SG: Off the Tee and SG: Tee to Green. Talk about a recipe for success. The 28-year-old said he decided to return to playing a draw, his preferred ball flight when he was younger, and it’s working through the first 54 holes.
“I might have heeled a driver that has gone left to right, but I think every other shot has been right to left,” he said. “I had the inclination to try to like see what it felt like to hit something straighter today and just didn’t. Yeah, safe to say I’ll probably be doing that tomorrow, see what it gets me.”
Echavarria, 30, is the only player within eight strokes of the lead heading into the final round. The Colombian said he looked at the leaderboard at the turn and was trailing by seven or eight strokes and thought, “That’s not normal.”
Young’s birdie streak began at No. 3 and included a 33-foot putt that just fell over the front lip at the fourth. He made his lone bogey of the day – and just second for the week – at No. 14 but bounced back with birdies at Nos. 15 and 17.
Echavarria, a two-time Tour winner, ranks second to Young in SG: Putting this week. He reeled off five birdies on the back nine, including a 6-footer at the last. Despite trailing by five, he said he likes his chances.
“Because I’ve been there before and I like being in this position, I like being in the final group,” he explained. “I’m not going to hide tomorrow. Yeah, we play tournaments to win. When I’m in the final group on Sunday, that’s why I put so much work into it.”
Earlier this year, Tommy Fleetwood, who along with Young, would rank as the top current players never to win on Tour, squandered his chance to close out the Travelers Championship as Keegan Bradley tracked him down and pipped him with a birdie at the last.
“Until he does it, it’s that unrealized dream that I’m sure he’s had since he young age,” PGA Tour Radio’s Mark McCumber said of Young. “He’s wise enough to know that if he blinks or tries to protect anything there are guys that can shoot 61, 62 here.”
Indeed, he is. Young said as much and promised to keep the gas pedal down on Sunday. “I know that there is an 8, a 9, a 10 under out there and I’d like to be the one to shoot it as opposed to someone in second or third place tomorrow,” he said.
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