There’s only one thing that’s going to satisfy Jordan Spieth—and his legion of fans—on Sunday afternoon at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth and that’s a victory at the Charles Schwab Challenge. In case you’re late to the “Woe is Spieth” parade, the 25-year-old Texan hasn’t won since his Open Championship victory at Royal Birkdale some 20 months ago, and the drought has become, well, sort of a thing.
Spieth starts the final round in a five-way tie for second, two strokes back of Kevin Na, whose record at Colonial (a 66.71 scoring average in his last seven rounds) suggests he’s not going to just fade away. And with Spieth’s final-round scoring average on tour this year being 72.90, ranking his 206th, there’s still a lot of work to be done for the three-time major winner to finally grab career tour win No. 12.
The good news for Spieth? Through three rounds at Colonial, a place where he took home the title in 2016, he’s having statistically one of the best putting weeks of his life. On Thursday, he had a strokes-gained/putting, literally the best of his career—+5.40—as he didn’t miss a putt from inside 15 feet.
And after play concluded on Saturday, Spieth having shot a third-round 68, he had mind-blowingly set another all-time best. Thanks to having holed three putts of 40 feet or longer this week (a career first), Spieth had made 434 feet, 4 inches of putts total. How good is that? Well, it not only is the most he’s ever holed in three rounds of a PGA Tour event, it’s also the most he’s ever holed in four rounds.
Spieth’s previous four-round record was 432 feet, 5 inches at the 2015 Tour Championship, where he pulled out a four-stroke victory. His other top four-round marks were 431 feet, 6 inches at Colonial in 2016 (en route to victory), and 410 feet, 10 inches at the 2015 Valero Texas Open (where he finished second).
(Brief aside: Guess the guy loves putting in Texas?)
For the record, Spieth broke the PGA Tour record for most holed putts through three rounds (Chris Stroud held the previous mark of 420 feet at Colonial in 2015) and incinerated his own previous three-round best was 326 feet, 11 inches at the 2017 Northern Trust. That’s a Bob Beamon-like leap past his own record.
With his personal four-round best well in hand, Jordan can also eye the all-time PGA Tour mark on Sunday. Here are best four-round holed putt records on tour since ShotLink began to track such data in 2004:
551 feet, 2 inches—Ben Martin, 2015 Charles Schwab Challenge, T-10
546 feet, 11 inches—Zac Blair 2017 Wells Fargo Championship, T-12
541 feet, 10 inches—Russell Henley, 2017 Houston Open, Win
541 feet, 1 inch—Shawn Stefani, 2014 Houston Open, fifth
Not surprisingly, Spieth leads the field in strokes-gained/putting through 54 holes at 9.154. All this is well and good, but we’re guessing Spieth would accept his putter cooling off a little on Sunday so long as he walks off with the thing he wants most: a long missing PGA Tour win.