NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. — Alex Smalley kept his composure amid pure chaos Saturday in the PGA Championship, both when he vanished from the leaderboard with a shaky start and when he surged back in front with sublime shots along the back nine at Aronimink Golf Club.
Smalley’s voice was calm and steady after signing for a 2-under-par 68 for a two-shot lead in a major tournament. He recognizes the stakes and the stage for someone who has yet to win on one of golf’s top-level professional tours.
“I’m trying to downplay that as much as I possibly can just to make it seem like any other golf tournament, because essentially that’s all it really is,” Smalley said.
One look at the leaderboard would illustrate this 108th PGA Championship is wildly different. Fourteen players had at least a share of the lead at some point Saturday. There was a seven-way tie for the lead with an hour left in the third round until Smalley’s big finish.
And he’s still left with an all-star cast of contenders — 11 of them major champions — within five shots, a list that includes two-time reigning Masters champion Rory McIlroy, who is No. 2 in the Official World Golf Ranking; Scottie Scheffler, who won the PGA Championship last year at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina, and has been ranked No. 1 for three straight years; LIV Golf League champion Jon Rahm, a two-time major champion; and Xander Schauffele, who won the PGA Championship and the British Open two years ago.