The leaderboard certainly is stacked. Three Olympians are within three shots of the lead.

One is world No. 1 Scheffler, the first golfer with five wins in a PGA Tour season since Justin Thomas in 2016-17. Scheffler shot 3-under on the front nine, got into trouble with a couple of bogeys on the back but closed his round with four consecutive birdies to complete his second-straight 6-under 64 round.

Scheffler was grouped with Bhatia on Saturday, and the two fed off one another. Bhatia also finished at 6-under 64 to tie his partner at 17-under for the tournament, each of them making similar highlights with birdies on the final two holes.

“I was pretty nervous stepping on that first tee today playing with him,” Bhatia, 22, admitted. “For us to finish the way we did was really good because we were just trying to get done, and I think the pace that we played at and the shots we were hitting, it kind of added up to a nice score.”

Said Scheffler: “Sometimes when you’re in pairs you can feed off each other the wrong or the right way. Today, especially at the end, we were feeding off each other, what I would say, in the right way. It’s always a good thing.”

Xander Schauffele, the 2022 champion who exited two shots behind the lead at 16-under 194 despite the fatigue from a long (and successful) season that he hasn’t been able to shake, shot his best round of the tournament so far at 6-under 64.

Sungjae Im is right there with him, climbing into that fourth-place tie with seven birdies, no bogeys during his 7-under 63 round. Collin Morikawa made a push to the top of the leaderboard as well, but shot his driver into a rightside bunker on No. 15 and settled for bogey. He is three shots back of the lead at 15-under through 54 holes.

How challenging will the course be?

“It really depends on the weather,” Scheffler said. “I think I saw that the wind were goings to be up a little bit and depends if we get more rain overnight. So there will be a bit, a few different factors going into it, but I’ll wake up tomorrow, see how the course is playing and go from there.”

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