Schauffele battles back to make the cut at the PGA Championship, extends streak to 64 tournaments

Xander Schauffele kept his cut streak alive — barely.

The defending champion shot an even-par 71 on Friday at the PGA Championship to make the cut on the number at 1-over 143, extending his streak to 64 tournaments. He hasn’t missed a cut since the 2022 Masters.

It’s the longest since Tiger Woods’ 142-event run that started in 1998 and ended in 2005.

It was a nailbiter for sure and Schauffele said he knew he was “in trouble” when he dropped to 3 over for the tournament early in the round. But he holed a chip to save par on the par-5 seventh hole after finding the water, and then made birdie on two of the final seven holes to secure a spot in the field this weekend at Quail Hollow.

“It was hard for me,” Schauffele said. “Some guys made it look really easy there and I thought I was going to be one of this guys. Hopefully those are my bad two rounds of golf and I can shoot something nice and low this weekend.”

Masters champion Rory McIlroy also had some drama, making the cut on the number after bogeying 17 and 18.

McIlroy, the third-ranked Schauffele and No. 4 Collin Morikawa were all nine shots behind second-round leader Jhonattan Vegas.

McIlroy didn’t make it easy on himself after missing a short putt on the par-3 17th and then clanking his drive off the roof of a metal concession stand on the left side of the fairway on No. 18. He caught a break when the ball came to rest just feet from the creek, avoiding a potential drop and penalty stroke.

Six of the top 10 players in the world missed the cut — two-time PGA winner Justin Thomas (No. 5), Ludvig Aberg (No. 6), Hideki Matsuyama (No. 7), Russell Henley (No. 8), Sepp Straka (No. 9) and Shane Lowry (No. 10).

Jordan Spieth, who was looking to complete the career Grand Slam with a win this week, missed the cut by a stroke after a 68.

The top 70 players, including ties, made the cut.

Thomas came into the tournament as hot as any player in the field, having finished in the top two in three of his last four tournaments, including a playoff win over Andrew Novak at Harbour Town that snapped a three-year drought. But he bogeyed three of his final four holes to shoot 72, leaving him at 3-over 145.

Aberg was considered one of the favorites coming into the tournament, but shot 75 after an opening 70.

Straka and Lowry both shot 73-71 to finish one shot off the cutline.

Lowry took a costly bogey on the eighth hole when he tried to hit out of a pitch mark and his ball shot off to the right, prompting him to slam his club in the dirt.

Lowry called that bit of bad luck a “kick in the teeth.”

“I feel like I’ve played the last two holes beautifully and gave myself two lovely chances and to be honest,” Lowry said. “I didn’t think I needed to make birdie in the last, I thought 2 over was probably going to be good enough.”

Brooks Koepka shot 75-76 and missed the cut in back-to-back majors in the same year for the first time. He now has gone eight straight majors without a top-10 finish since winning the 2023 PGA Championship at Oak Hill, the longest such streak of his career.

The 54-year-old Phil Mickelson played his way out of the tournament Thursday when he shot 79. Mickelson has long been known as one of the best short-game players in the world, but it took him four shots to get out of the sand on No. 12. ___

AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf