Can Braden Thornberry do it again?
Last year, Thornberry, a former NCAA individual champion out of Ole Miss, won the Korn Ferry Tour Championship, that tour’s playoff finale, to skyrocket in points and earn his first PGA Tour card. Now, Thornberry finds himself tied for the lead entering Sunday’s final round of the Butterfield Bermuda Championship, the PGA Tour’s penultimate fall event.
The 28-year-old Thornberry needs another miraculous week, as he arrived in Southampton, Bermuda, sitting No. 178 in the FedExCup, almost 400 points shy of cracking the top 100, which will come with a retained full card next year.
“I feel like I’m very used to that type of pressure where a good week would go a long way,” said Thornberry on Friday, a day before he shot 2-under 69 in more windy conditions around Port Royal Golf Club, which co-leader Adam Schenk described as, “Laughable at times.”
(Play was delayed for 2 minutes because of a heavy rainstorm that quickly blew through; the shortest stoppage in PGA Tour history, breaking the record of 5 minutes set at the 2021 Memorial Tournament.)
Thornberry carded two of his three birdies on the back nine before eagling the par-5 17th hole, which helped him tie Schenk at 12 under, a shot clear of Max McGreevy (No. 100 to start this week) and three other players who are ranked between Nos. 101-150, Takumi Kanaya, Adam Hadwin and Chandler Phillips.
Thornberry’s most impressive score might’ve been his par on the par-3 16th in “a hurricane basically.” The hole is only playing 124 yards, and Thornberry chipped a 6-iron.
“I’ve told people before I feel like I play well a lot of times on easier golf courses with really hard conditions,” Thornberry said. “That’s kind of been my niche a little bit. You wouldn’t see it, but I played pretty good in Utah, and then in Mexico I missed the cut by a lot, but the second round, I had maybe one of the best ball-striking rounds I ever had. So, there’s been signs in the last month or so of just really good golf, just excited to put it together here and have a chance tomorrow.”
Thornberry won a whopping 11 times in college, while adding elite amateur wins at the Jones Cup and Sunnehanna Amateur, and making that vaunted 2017 U.S. Walker Cup team. Until this year, Thornberry was the only player from that 10-man squad, which included Scottie Scheffler and Collin Morikawa, to have turned professional and not earned his PGA Tour card.
Needing a solo second or better at last year’s KFT Championship to move into that tour’s top 30, Thornberry fired a 6-under 66 at French Lick to win by a shot, for once not faltering on a Sunday in contention as a pro.
“So last year on Korn Ferry in the summer, I had a run where I was in second place like four times going into Sunday, and I kept shooting kind of even or 1 over, nothing crazy, but kind of falling down to 15th or so,” Thornberry said. “Then I kind of finally figured it out in Boise. Same thing, I think I was second or third going into the round, ended up finishing fourth but played good on Sunday, and then a couple weeks later, was able to do that at the final tournament and win.
“I was able to win a bunch in college, but I don’t know if I’d forgotten it or what, but it had been a while, maybe three or four years. Hopefully with that recent stuff at the end of last year, hopefully I can carry it over.”
Schenk, 33, has played eight straight seasons since first earning his PGA Tour card, though he’s not won anywhere since he did so on the KFT in 2017. He entered the week at No. 134 in points and ranks No. 92 or worse in all four strokes-gained categories. His putting has been so frustrating that he’s been mostly hit putts one-handed; in Saturday’s high winds, he needed the slight touch of his left hand.
“A great opportunity to have for tomorrow,” Schenk said. “I know if I don’t, I have to go to Q-School if I don’t get inside the top 100, so that’s a pretty big motivator.”