Lowry level at Sawgrass, Power 'wasn’t very good at all today'
Shane Lowry plays a shot on the 18th hole during the first round of THE PLAYERS Championship on the Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass. Photo by Richard Heathcote/Getty Images
Shane Lowry got the least out of his first round at the Players Championship on Thursday morning.
Lowry bounced between 1-over and even par all the way around TPC Sawgrass, eventually finishing right where he started after an even-par 72 on Thursday morning.
Despite ranking second in strokes gained off the tee in the morning wave that was greeted with idyllic conditions, he suffered three bogeys when he stabbed a 3-footer for par on 11, found the water on his approach on 18 and three-putted the par-3 third hole. He covered those debts with birdies on 16, 2 and 4.
“I don’t know what I can say,” Lowry said. “Could’ve been better. Wasn’t. I’ll play tomorrow.”
Séamus Power, playing three groups behind Lowry in the morning, had his own share of struggles with four bogeys and two doubles before birdies on 6 and 9 drew some hope to finished 4-over 76.
“Yeah, that wasn’t very good at all today to be honest with you,” Power said. “A lot of work to do there tomorrow, so we’ll see. I kind of let shots go everywhere. Not my best.”
Power started rough with a bogey on 11 and double on the par-3 13th. After making the turn in 3-over, he went bogey-bogey-birdie-double-birdie on holes 2 through 6 before making a nice up and down for birdie on the par-5 ninth to finish.
“There’s a couple birdies near the end at least – some bit of encouragement,” he said.
In spite of Thursday’s performance – where Power lost strokes to the field off the tee, into the greens and putting – his form had been trending a bit upward after playing his way into two west coast signature event starts last fall.
“It was not the best example today, but all in all it’s been good. But on this golf course if you’re just off a little, you’ll have a very colorful scorecard there and you’re gonna drop shots all over the place. The rough is nasty, breezes kind of change directions.”
Lowry and Power will both need to gain some ground on Friday afternoon.
“That’s the thing with this golf course, there’s loads of chances if you can keep it on the fairways,” Power said. “So there’s no reason you can’t make eight or nine birdies going around here. That’s the mentality tomorrow, see if I can get back into red figures and you never know over the weekend.”
Rory McIlroy played late Thursday, starting his round birdie-birdie-bogey.
