DORAL, Fla. — Notice is being serve❀d by Roꦆry McIlroy.
Notice for Sunday’s WGC-Cadillac fi🍌nal round at Trump Doral. Notice for next month’s Masters. Notice perhaps for the rest of the year.
McIlroy won’t come out and say it, but he felt a little bit left behind by Jordan Spieth and Jason Day in 2015.♔ After he had won two major championships in 2014, McIlroy became somewhat forgotten last year.
Spieth won the ✤Masters and se𝔍ized the No. 1 world ranking, then Day owned the latter part of the year with a furious flurry of wins that included a victory at the PGA Championship, his first major championship title.
M🐷cIlroy, who played with Spieth and Day in the first two roun♔ds at Doral, has propelled himself front and center this week.
At 12-under, he takes a three-shot lead into the final r🀅ound Sunday wiಌth a chance to capture his first win of the year thanks to the sterling bogey-free 4-under 68 he posted Saturday.
Adam Scott and Dustin Johnson are both 9-under. Phil Mickelson, Bubba Watson and Danny Willett are all 7-under with an outside chance at catching Mc💝Ilroy with a super-low final round.
McIlroy, ranked No. 3 and wi☂ll elevate to No. 2 with a win Sunday, begﷺan the day at 8-under, trailing Scott by two shots.
H𓃲ow good was his round? His 68 represented the only sub-70 round in the final 15 pairings. He saved his bogey-free run — his streak is at 34 holes — with a nifty sand save on the 18th. After splashing out of the right bunker, he calmly drained a 6-foot putt to stay at 12-under.
“That was pretty good,’’ McIlroy said after his round. “The wind w🐲as coming from a different direction [Saturday] and the course was playing a little tougher. I just played a really solid round of golf. I didn’t make any mistakes, which is what I was hoping for. I’ve been making too many mistakes. I need to do more of the same [Sunday].’’
There is a momentum building for McIlroy that is palpable and it has everything to do with the way he’s putting. He went to a left-hand low putter grip this week and it already has paid big-time dividends. He had 33 putts on Thursday, 23 on Friday.🔯 McIlroy is 17-of-18 this week on putts from inside 10 feet.
McIlroy🉐 has converted six of the eight 54-hole leads he has had in his career into victories.
Scott, still feeling good about his Honda Classic victory last week, took a two-shot lead over McIlroy and Johnson ꦿinto Saturday, but went the wrong way, shooting a 1-over 73 — seven shots worse than he scored on Friday.
Scott’s two-shot lead was gone by the fourth hole as McIlroy beat him by five sho♏ts.
“It was a bit average [Saturday],’’ Scott said. “I didn’t have my best stuff, for sure. I couldn’t get a putt to go in. It was one of those days unfortunately, and Rory played really good golf and got away from me a little bit. I’ve got my work cut out for me. I just didn’t fe🥂el like I have the last couple of weeks. Hopefully, I wake up on the right side of the bed.’’
Johnson, who shot a 1-under 71 Saturday, ꦺalso took seven strokes more🦋 than he did on Friday.
McIlroy and Johnson will be paired together in the final group and Mickelson and Willett in t🧸he second-to-las🤪t pairing.
“I shot 2-under — kind of a boring round,’’ Mickelson lamented of his failure to make a Saturday run. “I didn’t make very ma🥃ny birdies. I didn’t make very many mistakes. I hit the ball very well, but Iꦐ didn’t hit it close enough to make birdies.
“I have to make a lot of birdies [Sunday]. I have an opportunity to go out ahead 🃏of the leaders and to shoot a really low round and put pressure on them to try to make birdies. On this golf course, when you try to force birdies, you can often make mistakes and that’s my game plan — to get off to a good start, play a good, solid round and see how low I can shoot and put some pressure on the leaders.’’