{"id":497314,"date":"2026-03-01T10:26:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-01T10:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/497314\/"},"modified":"2026-03-01T10:26:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-01T10:26:08","slug":"shane-lowry-again-with-chance-to-win-cognizant-co-leads-with-austin-smotherman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/497314\/","title":{"rendered":"Shane Lowry again with chance to win Cognizant, co-leads with Austin Smotherman"},"content":{"rendered":"

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. \u2014 Shane Lowry has yet another chance to win at PGA National.<\/p>\n

The native of Ireland who now calls South Florida home had a bogey-free round of 8-under 63 on Saturday, moving to 13 under and finishing with a share of the lead following three rounds of the Cognizant Classic.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s tied with Austin Smotherman, who battled his way to a 69. Lowry said his goal going into Saturday \u2014 which had tee times moved up because of anticipated bad weather \u2014 was just to get into one of the final two groups for Sunday, then did a little better than that.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou want to be near the leaders, keep an eye on them and see what they\u2019re doing,\u201d Lowry said. \u201cIf the conditions are like this tomorrow, there (are) low scores out there, so someone could come from the pack. It\u2019s not necessarily easy to lead around this golf course. There\u2019s a lot of very difficult shots. But I\u2019m up there where I want to be. I\u2019ve had a few chances to win this tournament, and hopefully I can convert it tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s had more than a few. It\u2019s almost become an annual tradition.<\/p>\n

Lowry was second in 2022 when the event was still called the Honda Classic, losing the lead in a most bizarre fashion at the end \u2014 getting caught in a deluge that wreaked havoc on the final hole. Sepp Straka wound up winning by one shot, and Lowry wound up getting soaked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou get good breaks and bad breaks, and that was a bad break,\u201d Lowry said. \u201cYeah, we\u2019ll see. Hopefully none of that tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"GOLF:<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The final round of the Cognizant Classic is Sunday on the Champion Course at PGA National. Here\u2019s a look at tee times, pairings and how to watch. <\/p>\n

He tied for fifth at PGA National a year later, had the solo lead going into the final round of the Cognizant before finishing tied for fourth in 2024, then tied for 11th last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere wasn\u2019t much wind out there, so there\u2019s certain things that aligned today to make it play easy enough, wind direction being one of them,\u201d Lowry said. \u201cBut you still need to go out there and hit the shots. The greens are firm. It can get away from you if you\u2019re not hitting the ball well. I felt like I did everything pretty good today.\u201d<\/p>\n

It seemed like things tried to get away from Smotherman \u2014 who led after Rounds 1 and 2 as well \u2014 a few times on Saturday, but he held it together just enough to finish knotted for the top spot.<\/p>\n

Back-to-back bogeys on the par-4 6th and the par-3 7th threatened to throw his round off-stride, but a birdie-birdie finish might have given him a little momentum headed into Sunday as he seeks what would be his first PGA Tour victory.<\/p>\n

Nico Echavarria (66) and Taylor Moore (67) were a shot back at 12 under, and Jimmy Stanger \u2014 who\u2019ll earn a check on tour for the first time since April 2024, after spending the last two years dealing with serious elbow issues \u2014 is alone in fifth at 11 under after shooting a 65 Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just feels good to be back,\u201d Stanger said. \u201cIt feels good to be playing a weekend. It\u2019s been a couple years. It\u2019s good to be healthy. It\u2019s just a cherry on top to be in contention here this week.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moving Day, as Saturdays tend to be called on tour, had some movers.<\/p>\n

Lowry\u2019s 63 tied Patton Kizzire for the round of the day; Kizzire moved up 45 spots into a tie for ninth at 8 under. Keith Mitchell and Beau Hossler both shot 64s to join Kizzire there, five shots behind the leaders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. \u2014 Shane Lowry has yet another chance to win at PGA National. The native…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":497315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":["post-497314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=497314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/497315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=497314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=497314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=497314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}