McIlroy rallies to remain in contention as Clark shots into early lead
Wyndham Clark had the lowest profile of the players who painted the leaderboards red on Thursday. On Friday, he took center stage in the morning wave with a second-round 67 that pushed him into the lead at 9-under with the first-round co-leaders yet to start.
“I imagine I won’t be leading at the end of today,” said Clark, who finished a shot ahead of afternoon starters Rickie Fowler and Xander Schauffele who shot 8-under 62s on Thursday.
“I imagine someone is going to go out there and get to 10-, 11-under, if not more. But yeah, I am glad to be done, and I get to relax and work on my game and get ready for tomorrow.
“I like the spot I'm in. … Leading a major at any point at any time is always a good thing.” Clark, who broke his PGA Tour maiden with a designated event victory at last month’s Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow, has started to find his professional stride. He’s displayed a deft touch when face with the particular challenges that Los Angeles Country Club has presented.
“There's a lot of creativity out there, so if you get in trouble, there's some holes where you've really got to be creative and have some fun, and I typically like doing that,” said Clark.
With a straight overcast and relatively calm day, scoring remained strong even if not quite the record lows of the opening round. That could change on the weekend when the forecast calls for sunnier and warmer conditions that could firm things up.
“Hopefully if it comes through with sun and some heat on the weekend … everything's going to sort of come back,” said Charley Hoffman, who shot 67 early Friday.
Rory McIlroy rallied to shoot 3-under 67 to reach 8-under overall after stuffing his tee shot to 2 feet on the finishing ninth hole. American Harris English charged home in 30 as well to cap off a second-round 66 to reach 7-under overall.
“I like where I'm standing, and we'll see what those guys shoot this afternoon,” said English.
“They can make it as difficult as they want to on the weekend. I think everyone’s going to get the U.S. Open they wanted to see.”
Dustin Johnson fought back from what could have been a devastating quadruple-bogey 8 on the second hole to get back to where he started after a birdie on 18 capped an even-par 70. He sits at 6-under with Australian Min Woo Lee.
“You want to get obviously off to a good start, and didn't do that,” Johnson said. “Making a quad on No. 2 definitely didn't get the day started off kind of how I envisioned it. But to battle back and get it back to even par for the day and 6-under for the tournament, so still right in the mix going into the weekend, definitely proud of the way I came back and finished off the round.”
Johnson’s third quadruple bogey of his majors career could have derailed him, dropping him completely off the leaderboard after starting two shots behind the co-leaders after an opening 64.
“Caught the corner of the (fairway) bunker and then chunked my bunker shot and then chunked the next one, skulled the next one. Everything that you could do wrong I did wrong,” Johnson said. “It happens sometimes, but just battled back and played a really good round of golf.” He was still 4-over on the day through seven holes before starting to chip his way back up the board with birdies at 8, 12, 15 and 18 remedied the damage of his snowman.
It was reminiscent of his final round in the 2015 PGA Championship at Whistling Straits when DJ made quad on the first hole after starting the day T8 but came back with six birdies and two eagles to shoot a 3-under 69 and tie for seventh.
Amateur Sam Bennett shot 68 to put himself in the major hunt again at 5-under after contending at the Masters in April. Reigning Open champion Cam Smith got to 4-under with a 67.
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