Corey Pereira
Sammamish, Wash. – Corey Pereira of Cameron
Park,
Calif. played just well enough in today’s third
round,
shooting a 2-over par 74, to hold his lead at the
22nd
Sahalee Players Championship (SPC), being held
at
Sahalee Country Club in Sammamish, Wash.
The championship, with a field of 66 elite male
amateur golfers from around the world, is being
contested over 72 holes of stroke play, with 36
holes
being played the first day, 18 the second, and 18
on
the third and final day.
Climbing up the leader board in pursuit of Pereira
are
Curtis Luck of Australia and Jonathan Sanders of
Chatsworth, Calif., both shooting 2-under par 70s
and
sitting at 4-under par total, three shots behind
Pereira.
There are only 10 players under par after three
rounds.
Pereira started today’s third round with a 6-shot
lead
and played steady golf for most of the day and
was
even-par after 13 holes. But he double-bogeyed
the
par-4 377-yard 14th hole on his way to shooting
74,
backing up to the field and will start tomorrow’s
final
round with his lead cut in half.
Pereira, who just finished his sophomore year
playing
for the University of Washington men’s golf team,
had
finished tied for second in last year’s SPC. His
strategy
for Sahalee’s tree-lined layout is much different
than
the typical approach. “I like to play aggressive off
the
tee here,” he said. “I always hit a lot of drivers
here
(while other players hit long irons and hybrids).
But
that’s what held me back today; I just couldn’t
keep
the ball on the planet today off the tee.” Pereira
had
blistered the course during yesterday’s 36-hole
opening day, firing a 7-under par 65 in the
morning
round, followed by a 2-under 70 in the afternoon.
Courtesy Sahalee Players Championship
ABOUT THE
Sahalee Players Championship
Inaugurated in 1992, the Sahalee Players
Championship (SPC) was a major summer amateur
event until 2019 when it was
discontinued. In 2023, it was converted into a college
event hosting the top men's
teams in the country. Team (best four scores out of five
players each round) and
individual competitions.
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