Clark sets a big target at Players

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Florida – Scottie Scheffler had his 25th consecutive round under par in The Players golf Championship, and this was hard work. He felt pain in his neck that required treatment on the course, and he struggled to swing and to stay within range of Wyndham Clark.

Clark was playing in the group behind, oblivious to Scheffler’s injury or anything else.

He ran off four straight birdies on the front nine and finished with a 7-under 65, one shot short of the 36-hole record at the TPC Sawgrass.

He had a five-shot lead as Rory McIlroy and Xander Schauffele set out in a hot, breezy afternoon to try to catch him, AP reported.

Scheffler was simply happy to be done. He felt something wrong on his fourth full swing of the day, a shot that went left on the par-5 11th that kept him from a good look at birdie. He got treatment before his tee shots on three straight holes and managed a 3-under 69.

“I felt a little something in my neck, and then I tried to hit my tee shot on 12, and that’s when I could barely get the club back,” Scheffler said through a PGA Tour official.

“So I got some treatment, maybe loosened it up a tiny bit. But most of the day, I was pretty much laboring to get the club somehow away from me.”

The hope for Scheffler is he would have free range by the weekend. The concern is that he already was No. 1 in the world and appearing to hit another gear coming off his five-shot victory last week at Bay Hill until this injury interruption.

Clark is proving each week to be a serious challenger no matter Scheffler’s condition.

The US Open champion already shot 60 at Pebble Beach to win in 54 holes because of weather, and he was the only player who mounted any challenge against Scheffler at Bay Hill last week, finishing runner-up.

He got through the back nine on another calm, sunny morning in 1 under and then started hitting everything close to perfect – a wedge to 18 inches on No. 1, a simple up-and-down for birdie on the par-5 second, a 12-foot birdie putt on the par-3 third and a wedge to 4 feet on the fourth hole.