Third-round Valspar Championship leader Ryan Moore is looking for his fifth PGA Tour win, but the golf gods haven’t been kind to 54-hole leaders of late. Here’s what You Oughta Know heading into the final round at Innisbrook’s Copperhead Course in Palm Harbor, Fla., where Moore leads Jordan Spieth by one shot:
• A 54-hole leader or co-leader has not won on the PGA Tour over the last seven events.
• The last nine 54-hole leaders or co-leaders failed to break par in final round
• The last 54-hole leader to win was Bill Haas, who was tied for the lead after three rounds at the Humana Challenge.
• Only two of the previous seven Valspar winners held or shared the 54-hole lead (Kevin Streelman and Jim Furyk).
• From Moore’s standpoint, the outlook is slightly brighter - he has converted half (3 for 6) of his previous 54-hole lead on Tour.
• Moore has not exactly been Mariano Rivera as a closer lately. He shot 76 on Sunday at Doral to finish T9, and he’s a combined 8 over par for his most recent three final rounds.
• If Moore wins, he is projected to move to into the top 20 in the Official World Golf Ranking (17th) for the first time
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• Moore’s most recent win was the CIMB Classic last November, part of the PGA Tour’s 2014-15 wraparound schedule. If he wins Sunday, it would mark the first time he has won more than once in a season.
• Spieth, 21, is looking for his second official PGA Tour win. If he gets it, he would become the youngest two-time Tour winner since Sergio Garcia in 2001.
• A Spieth win would be his third worldwide win since the end of November (Australian Open, Hero World Challenge).
• Spieth would be the third-youngest two-time Tour winner of the last 25 years, behind Tiger Woods and Garcia.
• A win would move Spieth to sixth in the OWGR, a career high.
• Derek Ernst, who trails by two, is a perfect 42-for-42 on putts inside 7 feet this week.
• Even if Ernst doesn’t win, he appears likely to notch his first top-50 finish of the season.
• Sean O’Hair, three shots off the lead, is looking for his fifth career PGA Tour win and first since the 2011 Canadian Open.
• Matt Kuchar (four shots back) is Mr. Consistency - he has 50 top-10 finishes since the beginning of 2010 (12 more than anyone else in that span)
• Vijay Singh (five shots back), who will be 52 years and 22 days old on Sunday; would be the second-oldest winner in PGA Tour history, behind only Sam Snead, who was 7 1/2 months older when he won the 1965 Greater Greensboro Open.
(Research by Golf Channel Sr. Researcher Justin Ray)