Kevin

Kisner

The Georgia Bulldog settled for just 5-of-14 fairway and 6 GIR today. He lost more than six strokes off-the-tee. This will go in the books as his third career mid-tournament WD, in 292 PGA TOUR starts. Kisner hasn’t found himself inside of the top 25 after any round this season as he attempts to regain his lost form.

The Georgia Bulldog finds himself at 46th in the OWGR but that number will fall fast if he doesn’t snap out of his current slump. Kisner posted a 75th-place finish last week at THE PLAYERS and was was an improvement over three straight missed cuts. He’s landed just one top 15 since last year’s WGC-Match Play (21 starts). Kisner has lost 38 strokes tee-to-green over his last 24 measured rounds, fifth lowest in the field, using the same number of rounds as a measurement. Will the Valspar be the cure he’s looking for? Kisner sports a 3-for-5 record at the Copperhead Course with a T24 at the 2019 edition being the best on his tournament resume.

The South Carolina native was four wins to his name but is still searching for his first in the Palmetto State. He’s come close at the RBC Heritage, losing in a playoff of the 2015 edition. He’ll get a chance to add a South Carolina win to his resume as the TOUR heads back to Congaree. Kisner missed the cut at the host course in his only previous visit but Kisner was arriving on the heels of four missed cuts in his five lead-in starts that season. This time around, he has top 25s in three of his last six starts. Kisner is making his first start of the new season and first competitive action since the Presidents Cup where he went 0-2-1 to earn just half a point for Team USA.

Love jokingly called up Tiger Woods as his 12th participant, a nod to the playing captain from the last time the matches were held in 2019 at Royal Melbourne. Instead it will be Kisner, who has played sparingly this week as a captain’s pick while going 0-1-1 on a course where he was a runner-up at the 2017 PGA Championship. Kisner will have plenty of time to sleep in Sunday, teeing off at 2:14 p.m. ET, and he’ll likely hope the Americans have clinched the Cup before he hits the Green Mile. Facing him for the Internationals will be South Africa’s Christiaan Bezuidenhout, who also faced Kisner in his lone match of the four team sessions. That came Friday afternoon in Fourballs play, as Bezuidenhout and Mito Pereira tied with Kisner and Cameron Young. One of the shorter hitters on either side, Kisner has played first from most fairways in his first two matches but is still listed as a -135 favorite to take down Bezuidenhout in the week’s final match.

There aren’t any shockers here as Will Zalatoris was skipped over due to injury. Every other pick falls in line with the qualifying standings with the exception was Kevin Kisner who leap-frogged Tom Hoge and J.T. Poston on the list at the bottom. It’s easy to make a case for Kisner with his Carolina roots and recent success in match-play events. Captain Love shared the same sentiment, “There are a lot of great players who excel in match play, but Kevin Kisner thrives off of this format and I know he is eager to compete at Quail Hollow. As a South Carolina native and one of the more popular players on TOUR, he will bring some vocal fans with him and help to build an atmosphere that our team embraces.” This group of six will round out the team which already included Scottie Scheffler, Patrick Cantlay, Xander Schauffele, Sam Burns, Justin Thomas, and Tony Finau. Team USA are heavy favorites in the early betting markets (-500) for the event which will take place the week of September 20-25.

“This is it,” said the 38-year-old South Carolina native. “This is a big stretch to win the FedExCup and you have to be at East Lake to win it. So the goal is to go there and have a chance. I’m right on the verge, I just need to play solid these next few weeks and everything will take care of itself.” Kisner is making his eighth start in the Wyndham, where he’s never missed the cut with a win in 2021 among his three top 10s. Last year at Sedgefield, he beat five other players in a six-man playoff after they all tied at 15-under 265. Kisner shot four rounds in the 60s with 66-66 on the weekend to get into the playoff and won with a birdie on the second extra hole. He finished T-3 in 2020 and T-10 in 2016. On the season, Kisner has made 11 cuts in 21 starts with five top 10s including a solo second at the WGC-Match Play and T-3 at the Sony Open in Hawaii.

The 38-year-old, who began the day solo 4th, four back of overnight leader Schauffele, connected for back-to-back birdies at holes 4 and 5, both from between 10 and 23 feet, but played his final 13 in birdie-less 3-over, squaring bogey-5s at 10, 17 and 18 (3-putt from 58'7"). This was his sixth Travelers, third cash and second top 10, second straight after a T5 last year, and his fifth top 10 of the season in 19 events, first since finishing solo 2nd at the WGC-Match Play eight starts ago. For the week, the Georgia alum signed for rounds of 67-64-66-71, totaled one eagle and 17 birdies versus seven bogeys, and ranked 42nd SG: Tee-to-Green (1.720), losing 1.430 strokes TTG in Rounds 3 and 4, and 5th SG: Putting (7.668), drug down by a -0.739 SGP on Sunday.

The Georgia alum, who checked in off five consecutive missed cuts (in individual events), began the day in a five-way T2, five back of overnight leader Xander Schauffele, and ended the day down two spots to solo 4th. However, he’s one swing closer to leader Schauffele, nipping him 66 vs. 67 today, and will be in the penultimate pairing on Sunday with TOUR rookie Sahith Theegala, scheduled for 1:45 pm ET. The 38-year-old, who’s posted rounds of 67-64-66, is eying a fifth TOUR title in 276 events, first since the 2021 Wyndham 21 starts ago, where he came from four back (T3) with 4-under 66 before prevailing in a 6-man, 2-hole playoff. At the three-quarter mark, he ranks 34th SG: Tee-to-Green (2.305), lowlighted by a -0.845 TTG today, and No. 1 SG: Putting (8.407), including a 3.634 SGP in R3. See link below to post-round comments.

The Georgia alum, who arrived off five consecutive missed cuts (in individual events), including by one at last week’s U.S. Open (73-71), brushes that aside with rounds 67-64 and will be in the third-to-last pairing in R3 with Cam Davis. This is his first time this season in 19 events that he’s in the top 10 thru 36 holes and first since last season’s Rocket Mortgage 11 months ago (won by Davis), where he was T6 before finishing T8 (67-69-69-68). At the halfway mark this week, the 38-year-old has totaled one eagle, a 3 today at 13 from 6'7" after a stellar approach from 260 yards, and nine birdies against two bogeys, and ranks 32nd SG: Tee-to-Green (3.150) and 6th SG: Putting (4.773), including a 2.907 SGP on Friday. This is his sixth Travelers and third made cut, cashing a T15 in 2019 and a T5 last year, where he was T4 at the halfway pole (70-63-74-63). See link below to post-round comments.