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U.S. Open Day 3: Sisk Posts 71 Early,
Climbs Leaderboard Late
June 19th by Dominic Dastoli
Southampton, NY-At the U.S.
Open, when you tee off can mean the difference between avoiding
tough playing conditions and being abused by them. As the
world’s best players spent yesterday afternoon contending with
Shinnecock’s increasingly slick greens, thick rough, and
menacing wind, Cleveland Golf Tour star Geoff Sisk watched from
his hotel room as his name gradually rose up the leaderboard.
Teeing off around 9:30, Sisk’s solid round of 1-over par 71 gave
him a three day total of 5-over 215.
Sisk’s day started
off innocently enough with three straight pars. After that,
though, his round was a game of give and take as he practically
matched birdies and bogies all the way to the clubhouse. It
began with a bogey at the par four 4th to fall to
5-over par. After making a disappointing par at the par 5 5th
hole, he birdied the par four 6th to move back
to even. But he then gave it right back with a bogey at the
difficult par three 7th hole.
Following pars at
eight and nine to turn at even par for the day, Sisk began his
back nine with a bang with birdies at both 10 and 11. As the
wind began to pick up, however, club selection became a guessing
game and he managed only one birdie at the par 5 16th
to go with three bogies over his final seven holes.
Tied for 26th
place as the leaders were finishing, Sisk enters the final day
with more than a big paycheck on the line. A top 15 finish will
make him exempt into next year’s U.S Open. If he plays
exceptionally well and finishes 8th or better, he
would gain an invitation into the Masters.
More importantly,
though, Sisk seems determined to show that he can hold his own
against golf’s brightest stars. As he said last Sunday following
his win in the Cleveland Golf Tour’s Atkinson Open, “I know I
can’t beat Tiger Woods on a daily basis, but I can compete with
these guys.” With the most exciting day in all of golf on the
horizon, Sisk seems determined to prove exactly that.
Appropriately enough, through three rounds, Sisk sits just one
shot back of Tiger Woods.
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