When you think of professional golfers who excel when grinding their way around the course, Scottie Scheffler is right up there with the very best.
Sure, his peerless ball-striking hardly ever lets him down, but when it does, Scheffler clearly relishes the challenge os posting a good score without his ‘A game’ in tow.
The 28-year-old American is currently sitting four shots off the lead held by Si Woo Kim at the RBC Heritage.
Scheffler bemoaned unlucky breaks at the RBC Heritage on day two, but day three was a different story.
The two-time major champion was quite clearly missing his best stuff on Saturday, and his round was extremely ‘un-Scheffler like’.
Perhaps the best compliment anyone can give Scheffler is that his third round seemed like a battle from start to finish, yet he still ended the day three-under par.
The Texan seems to thrive when the going gets tough, and always comes out the other end with little harm done to his scorecard.
Scottie Scheffler says something ‘great’ could happen on day four of RBC Heritage
If Scheffler is going to make up four shots on Si Woo Kim and three on Justin Thomas on Sunday, he will probably need to shoot a six-under par 65 at the very worst.
The World No.1 needs to avoid the silly little mistakes that crept into his game on Friday and Saturday, and he absolutely must hole more putts.
Judging by his comments after day three, anything could be possible for him on the final day of the RBC Heritage.
Scheffler spoke after his third round 68 at Harbour Town Links, and opened up on what was a challenging day on the golf course for him:
“I feel like I’ve been hanging in there the last couple of days. I had a day on Thursday where I played really good, and then the last two days have been a bit of a battle out there, I’m not exactly sure why that is. I’ve kept myself in the tournament right now, I think I’m five back and only three back of second. So I’m still right in the tournament, a great round tomorrow goes a long way. I feel like I’m really close,like for instance today I get a really good bounce on 10, goes to about 10 feet, hit a really good putt and it didn’t go in. Next hole I hit kind of a wild tee shot and I make back to back bogies. I hit a decent punch shot over the green into the bunker and I have absolutely no shot to get on the green. Little stuff like that, I knew I couldn’t go over the green there – the miss was short and I hit it long. Just little things like that I need to improve on. Today was a day where I was close to getting it going. I did a lot of good things out there today and if I keep it in there mentality and keep doing the things I’m doing I think tomorrow could be a great day”
That’s a bold shout from Scheffler, but nobody would be surprised to see him defend his RBC Heritage crown this week.
Scottie Scheffler has regressed from 2024 levels in one department
The 28-year-old American has not been as imperious with his iron play this season as he was last year.
The stats don’t show a huge discrepancy, but they may well explain why he still hasn’t won this season.
In 2024 Scheffler was ranked first in ‘strokes gained approach to green’, with a score of +1.269. However, this season he has dropped down to sixth, with a score of +0.871 (PGA Tour website).
That equates to the two-time major champion losing out on just over 1.5 shots per tournament on average.
Scheffler’s first win of the season clearly isn’t too far away. However, he will obviously have to tighten up his iron play, if he is to return to the winner’s circle.
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