Stevens, An will take a shot at their first PGA Tour win
Jan. 14—Sam Stevens and Byeong Hun An are among a handful of golfers near the top of the Sony Open in Hawaii leaderboard in search of their first PGA victory.
If they have an advantage over the others, it is they have experience being in contention heading into a final round.
Stevens fired a 7-under 63 in Saturday's third round and is third at 197, while An shot a 2 under and is tied for fourth at 199 at Waialae Country Club.
Keegan Bradley and Grayson Murray share the lead at 196.
Stevens, 27, and An, 32, are among five players in the top eight who haven't won on the PGA Tour.
The others are Taiga Semikawa, 23; Matthieu Pavon, 31; and Ben Silverman, 36.
"I haven't looked exactly who is up there," Stevens said. "It's hard to win out here. There are a lot of guys that haven't won out here. Yeah, I'm excited to have the opportunity."
Stevens was in contention twice during his 2023 PGA rookie season.
He held a share of the lead going into the final round at March's Corales Puntacana Championship in the Dominican Republic and wound up placing third.
The following week at the Valero Texas Open in San Antonio, he entered the final round tied for fourth and finished second.
"I was in this position a couple times last year with a chance to win," said Stevens, who missed the cut at last year's Sony Open. "Sometimes I played good and gave myself a chance; other times, not so much. Hopefully tomorrow I can keep putting the ball in the fairway."
An had three top-five finishes on tour last season, including a tie for second at August's Wyndham Championship in Greensboro, N.C.
"Coming into this week if you told me before I started I would definitely take it," An said of being tied for fourth heading into the final round. "Three back, you know, just got to tie things up. Hopefully I don't make any silly mistakes."
On Saturday, Stevens birdied three holes on the front nine and four on the back.
"Yeah, it was good all day," he said. "I was able to get the ball in the fairway a lot. Plenty of wedge holes out here and birdie opportunities, especially if you're playing from the fairway."
Stevens had 3-under 67s in the opening two rounds.
"I know I've been making a bunch of birdies the first couple days," he said. "I don't know exactly how many. Far too many bogeys and silly mistakes. Today I was able to avoid those."
An was tied for the lead with Austin Eckroat and Carl Yuan heading into Saturday.
An had six birdies and four bogeys in the third round. Over the first two rounds, he had one bogey.
"It was disappointing where I finished, I think," An said. "Hit some poor shots, hit good shots, ended up in poor spots."
Chris Kirk, a six-time PGA Tour winner, also is tied for fourth after shooting a 3 under. He was happy to see new faces contending at Waialae.
"It's a great mix of players here this week" Kirk said. "Strong field, so a lot of veterans and guys with a bunch of wins, and then a lot of people that maybe have been on tour for a while and haven't won and then you have the rookie class coming up. So it's always exciting every year when you have the new players come up and I always try to do my best to introduce myself to everybody and say hello and tell them if they need anything don't hesitate."
