Collin Morikawa entered the 88th Masters Tournament in relatively poor condition.
Despite being a historically great iron player with a penchant for success at Augusta National, he was overlooked as a potential player to win the green jacket this year.
Mr. Morikawa is proving all his doubters wrong. He also does so after making the unusual decision to change putters after Thursday’s opening round.
Morikawa made the most of it. He improved his score each day at Augusta, shooting a 3-under 69 on Saturday.
This puts him at 6 under par for the tournament and advances to Sunday’s final pairing with world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler.
After his round, Morikawa joined CBS Sports’ Amanda Balionis to elaborate on his approach to these changes.
“Why not? Build your own game plan. Build your own path to the final round. Are you tied for first at the beginning of the week, or are you one shot behind heading into Sunday? If you asked me if I would go back, I would.”
from california 2.98 stroke increase Putting on the field on Friday and stroking on Saturday.
Morikawa has been struggling with matches since the second half of 2023. He also injured his back in December, forcing him to withdraw from the Netflix Cup in Las Vegas.
But everything seems to be coming together again at the right time.
“I did a quick look through the encyclopedia of things I’ve done in the past. I found something on Monday and I’m going to stick with it,” Morikawa said.
He certainly found something right.
Many star players missed out due to windy conditions, but some of them posted scores in the 80s. Tiger Woods scored a career-worst 82 points on Saturday after setting a record for his 24th consecutive Masters appearance.
However, Morikawa was the only player to break 70.
But the work is not done yet. He’ll need another better round to earn his first Green Jacket Sunday.
Kendall Capps is the senior editor of SB Nation’s Playing Through.For more golf coverage, follow us @_PlayingThrough On all major social media platforms.
