This post summarizes the results from round 3 of my 2023 PGA Championship Replay at Oak Hill (Acorn Hill). Previous posts have discussed the history of the event, day conditions in 2023, and results for rounds 1 and 2 for both the replay and actual tournament.
Acorn Hill is a par 70 with narrow fairways and a 7-Iron club restriction for all shots from the regular rough. The actual field of 156 players was trimmed to 76 following round 2. For all four rounds, I am using all 70 of the APBA golfers who played in the event and were carded for 2023.
Actual Event
On “moving day” Brooks Koepka shot a 3rd round score of 66 and took over 1st place from the 2nd round leaders, Corey Conners (70), Viktor Hovland (70), and Scottie Scheffler (73). By round three’s end, Connors and Hovland had dropped into a tie for 2nd place, and Scheffler had fallen into a tie for 5th with Justin Rose (69). Bryson DeChambeau (70) took sole position of 4th place.
After three rounds, only seven players remained under par for the tournament. The qualifiers averaged 72.6 shots – 2.6 strokes over par. In rounds one and two, the qualifiers averaged 71.6 and 70.6 strokes, respectively. The weather likely affected the 3rd round scores in that noon temperatures were in the mid-60’s and light rain continued from the previous day.
The low score of the day was posted by Koepka, matching his 2nd round score of 66 (-4). Tommy Fleetwood (68) posted the next lowest score. Seven other players shot 69, bringing to nine the total number of players who shot under par for round three. The top-10 leaderboard is provided below.
Replay Event
For round 3 the pin was located at position 3, the wind Calm, and course conditions Soft (-5 yards FW roll and no green roll adjustments). The hole distances for pin placement 3 resulted in the 7360-yard layout shown below.
After three rounds hole no. 17 has proved to be the most difficult (+0.42), followed closely by hole no. 6 (+0.38). Both are 510-yard dogleg right par 4s. Pin 3 is positioned at the back of both greens, penalizing overly aggressive play with FW woods or long irons with missed greens (often long) and too conservative play with very long putts or chips.
Hole no. 17 is tree-lined on the right of the fairway, before and after the dogleg, and has only 10 yards of fairway left of the centerline at the 275-yard mark off the tee. At 285 yards and 15 yards left of the centerline, the player is in the rough, which brings the “maximum of a 7-iron” rule for this course into effect. In addition, the carry on all tee shots is reduced by 10 yards, making it play even longer.
Hole 6, aka “Double Trouble,” has a stream and deep rough lining the right of the fairway. These features come into play about 270 yards off the tee and extend down the right side of the FW to about 340 yards from the tee. The stream then crosses the centerline of the fairway at 400 yards and continues up the left side of the fairway to just beyond the green. Then the stream turns back right and crosses 10 – 15 yards behind the green.
By course board rule, “shots landing between the green and the water bounce 5 yards towards the water before taking any roll.” Thus, W/I shots long or left of the green are at risk. A long deep bunker awaits shots that miss right of the green. To this point in the tournament, hole no. 6 has had nearly twice the number of double bogies (17) than any other hole on the course.
Round 3 Replay Results
Brooks Koepka and Andrew Putnam posted the day’s top score of 66. Koepka moved up from T6 to T2. Putnam moved up from T11 to T4. The next best score was 67, shared by Viktor Hovland and Jordan Spieth. While neither made the top-10 leaderboard, Hovland moved up from T24 to 11th place, and Spieth moved up from T46 to T22. In all, fifteen players were under par in the replay of round three.
Patrick Cantlay (68) took sole possession of 1st place, and Rory McIlroy (69) moved down from T1 into a tie for 2nd place with Brooks Koepka. Xander Schauffele (70) moved up from 5th place, and Scottie Scheffler (71) dropped from T1 into a tie for 4th place with Andrew Putnam. Max Homa (72) dropped from T1 into a tie for 7th place with Collin Morikawa (69).
The replay round 3 top-10 leaderboard is shown below.
This is how the actual tournament’s top-three leaders finished round 3 in the replay:
- Brooks Koepka (66) moved up in rank from T6 to T2.
- Scottie Scheffler (71) dropped from T1 to T4.
- Viktor Hovland (67) recovered from a 2nd round 73 and is now at even par for the tournament in 11th place.
Other round 3 highlights include:
- Eagles: Shane Lowry (hole no. 6); Adam Schenk (no. 4); Tyrrell Hatton (no. 13); Cameron Smith (no. 8)
- Most Fairways hit: Nine players – 10 of 14 fairways. (Avg. = 6.8)
- Fewest Fairways hit: Emiliano Grillo – 2 of 14.
- Most Greens in Regulation: Brooks Koepka – 15 of 18. (Avg. = 10.2)
- Fewest Greens in Regulation: Emiliano Grillo, Thornbjorn Olesen, Ben Griffin – 4 of 18.
- Adam Scott led all players in average driving distance (two holes) at 320 yards. (Avg. = 283)
- Min Woo Lee led all players in average driving distance (all drives) at 304 yards. (Avg. = 278)
- Min Woo Lee and Nick Hardy had the longest drives (360 yards).
- Russell Henley sank the longest putt at 49 feet on hole no. 18.
- Ryan Fox had the longest total distance of putts made (142.5 feet).
- Keegan Bradley and Patrick Cantlay had the fewest putts (25). (Avg. = 29.4)
- Brendon Todd had the most putts (35).
The entire set of results through round 3 of the replay can be viewed by clicking the upper righthand corner of the PDF below.