US PGA TOUR EARLY THIRD-ROUND NEWS

• Finally pain-free, Goosen finds his game

  • March 15, 2014 By Jeff Shain, PGATOUR.COM
•     Retief Goosen at Copperhead. (Greenwood/Getty Images(c)

GOOSEN GOES HOT WITH A 64
 
FROM THE US PGA TOUR WEBSITE
PALM HARBOR, Florida – About six holes into Saturday’s round, Retief Goosen had to vent a little frustration.
"I just can’t make a putt," he groused to caddie Mark Pittock.
It didn’t take long for his fortunes to change, coaxing home a curling 12-foot birdie at his next hole. Then the floodgates opened.
Goosen drained a 26-footer for birdie at No. 8, followed by a 10-footer at No. 9. Before his day at the Valspar Championship was finished, the South African had seven birdies on the way to a 7-under-par 64.
"I made one at No. 7 and hallelujah! Suddenly it started happening," said Goosen, twice a winner at Innisbrook. "Suddenly the hole was bigger."
The 64 was Goosen’s best since undergoing back surgery after the 2012 season. Though the final groups still were three hours from teeing off, he had gone from surviving the cut on the number to pulling alongside second-place Kevin Na.
Goosen even managed to make hay at the Copperhead course’s daunting "Snake Pit," starting with a chip-in when he came up short of the green at No.16. "That was a big turnaround," he said. "It’s never easy getting up-and-down around that green."
He followed with a 4-iron at the par-3 17th that caught a slope on the green and funnelled down to inside 4 feet for another birdie. Then after coming up well short from a fairway bunker at No. 18, Goosen’s pitch from 70 yards gave him an 8-foot par chance that he converted.
"It’s a golf course you’ll never be comfortable on," he said. "But it seems when I get on the course, I see the shots required that you need to try and hit."
Goosen hadn’t turned in a better scorecard since a 63 during the third round of the 2012 RBC Canadian Open. That was in the midst of chronic back woes, leading him undergo surgery after the US PGA Championship at Kiawah.
He played 11 events in 2013 before being forced to the sideline again by a small fracture in his back. 
That required four months away, but the two-time U.S. Open champion says he’s been pain-free since.
He tied for eighth at the Sony Open in Hawaii, but came to Innisbrook still looking for consistency.
"I just need to get into a good rhythm and hit good shot after good shot," he said.