Twelve hours after the third round began, the densely packed leaderboard at the 108th PGA Championship was no more revelatory than it was to begin the day.
Fourteen players held at least a share of the lead at some point during the third round. Twenty-two are at or within four shots of the lead, the most ever entering the final round of a PGA Championship.
Here are the top numbers and notes to know from Round 3 at Aronimink.
1. Alex Smalley’s first 54-hole lead in an Official World Golf Rating-sanctioned stroke-play event came at a major championship. The 29-year-old American has posted three consecutive rounds in the 60s, the lone player in the field who can make that claim. Smalley entered the week in good form, with four consecutive top-20 finishes on the PGA Tour. But it’s unquestionable that in just his fifth major start, Smalley, who has not yet won on Tour, would be one of the biggest surprise major champions this decade.
Smalley is trying to become the first American player to get his maiden PGA Tour victory in a major since Shaun Micheel at the 2003 PGA. He’s also trying to win after holding at least a share of the lead after every round. Since the inception of the PGA and DP World Tours, no player has posted his first win at a major championship after holding a piece of the lead each day.
2. Smalley, who ranked No. 53 this season on the PGA Tour in strokes gained putting entering the week, is third in that statistic through three rounds at Aronimink. His clutch birdie at 18 on Saturday was his 11th made putt of 10 feet or longer, the most in the field. To win the Wanamaker Trophy on Sunday, the Duke product will likely need to play the opening three holes better: Over the last two days, he is 5 over on those holes.
Smalley is 78th this week in the OWGR. The last player to get his first major championship win ranked outside the top 75 of the OWGR was Keegan Bradley (No. 115) 15 years ago at the PGA.
3. Five players are in a tie for second, the most entering the final round of the PGA Championship since six shared the spot in 1993 at Inverness. For what it’s worth, the eventual winner came out of that pack: Paul Azinger, who beat Greg Norman in a playoff.
Four of the five players who are tied for second are seeking their first major championship win. Aaron Rai would be England’s first PGA Champion in the stroke-play era and the first overall since Jim Barnes won the first two PGAs, in 1916 and 1919. Nick Taylor, who in 2023 became the first Canadian to win his national open since 1954, looks to join Mike Weir as Canada’s major champs in the men’s game.
Matti Schmid, 28, fired a 65 to put himself in Sunday contention for the first time at a major. The DP World Tour’s rookie of the year in 2021, Schmid led Saturday in strokes gained putting. Ludvig Åberg will get another golden opportunity at winning his first major Sunday, too. Åberg has had a leaky putter all week (72nd of 82 to make the cut in strokes gained on the greens), but his razor-sharp irons always give him a chance to win. Åberg is looking to join Henrik Stenson as the only men from Sweden to win a major title.
4. Completing the quintet is two-time major winner Jon Rahm. Even with two missed putts of less than 5 feet on the back nine, Rahm carded a stellar third-round 67 to cast a long shadow over Sunday’s proceedings.
Since leaving the PGA Tour for LIV before the 2024 season, Rahm’s performance during golf’s most important four weeks has become a referendum on the legitimacy of the breakaway league itself. Whether Rahm shoots 65 or 75 on Sunday won’t change much about the perception – and future — of LIV Golf as a whole. What a win Sunday would do, though, is resolidify Rahm as an unshakable force at the top of the sport.
No player from Spain has won the PGA Championship, the lone major the nation has yet to claim in the men’s game.
5. A 66 by Rory McIlroy has him in contention entering Sunday. McIlroy recorded a score of 66 or better for the 25th time at a major championship. Only Tiger Woods has more, with 28.
McIlroy birdied six of his first 13 holes Saturday, surpassing his birdies in the first two rounds combined (five). He’s in contention despite playing the par-5s in even par. In his six major wins, he was a combined 51 under par on par-5s.
McIlroy was tied for 104th after his opening round. The worst 18-hole position by an eventual winner in men’s major championship history is tied for 84th by Steve Jones at the 1996 U.S. Open. McIlroy is trying to become the first player to win the Masters and PGA Championship in the same season since Jack Nicklaus in 1975.
6. Looking for his second PGA Championship in three years, Xander Schauffele will play alongside McIlroy in the final round. It will be a familiar feeling for the two: At the 2018 BMW Championship at Aronimink, they were grouped in the final round. Bradley came from three shots back to win that event.
Schauffele entered last year’s PGA battling an intercostal injury, his driver (157th in SG Off the Tee) and his putter (140th in SG Putting). This week, a healthy Schauffele is in the top five in both of those statistics. A win Sunday would make him one of four American players currently under age 40 with three or more, alongside Scottie Scheffler, Brooks Koepka and Jordan Spieth.
7. Patrick Reed is in a tie for seventh, three strokes off the lead, after his best weekend round in a major (67) since the 2022 Open Championship. The 2018 Masters champion has hit just 18 of 42 fairways this week, but every other facet of his game has been very good: He’s fourth in scrambling, fifth in strokes gained approach and ninth in strokes gained tee to green through three days.
Reed will play alongside Maverick McNealy, a 54-hole co-leader who shot 71. McNealy’s best finish in a major championship is a tie for 18th at last month’s Masters.
Of the 68 PGA Championship winners in the stroke-play era, 67 were in the top seven after 54 holes.
Scottie Scheffler will begin the final round five strokes behind the leader. (Bill Streicher / Imagn Images)
8. World No. 1 Scheffler made just two birdies Saturday, scuffling to a 1-over-par 71. Scheffler will begin the final round in a tie for 23rd place, five strokes behind Smalley. No player has come from outside the top 20 entering the final round of a major to win. The largest such comeback belongs to Hale Irwin, who was in a tie for 20th entering the final round of the 1990 U.S. Open at Medinah.
After putting lights out in Round 1, Scheffler has struggled on the greens. He’s lost more than 3.7 strokes to the field putting the past two rounds, not making anything longer than 9 feet in that stretch. For the week, he’s missed 10 putts inside 10 feet, putting him at 71st of 82 players in that stat for the championship.
9. After the field combined to record just one round of 65 or better in Rounds 1 and 2, there were five Saturday. Aronimink played 2.61 strokes easier in Round 3 than in the second round, the largest such drop in a dozen years at the PGA Championship.
The field hit 65.4 percent of its greens in regulation Saturday, easily the highest rate of the week. The three-putt rate was also cut nearly in half compared with the opening round.
10. The largest 54-hole deficit overcome to win the PGA Championship is seven shots, done by John Mahaffey in 1978 and Justin Thomas four years ago. Each of the last 13 men’s major winners has been in either first or second place entering the final round.
The Wanamaker Trophy has been won by an American each of the last 10 years. An 11th in a row would be the longest such run since players from the United States won 14 in succession from 1948 to 1961.