The PLAYERS Championship 2024: Round Three Weather Reports Explored

Weather trouble has been plaguing THE PLAYERS Championship since day 1. Despite the weather being predicted to be warm and sunny throughout the day, the latter round of some on the field was postponed to Friday. Sadly, the same pattern followed suit during round 2, when Ben Silverman and Riyo Hisatsune saw their rounds postponed to Saturday morning. Now the big question remains: will the third round end the same way?

As per weather reports, Saturday will see a slight chance of rain (20%). Expected rainfall is to be a mere 0.05 inches, while temperatures are predicted to be as high as 80F and fall to a low of 66F during the day. A breezy day can be expected too, with winds blowing from south to southeast at speeds of 10 to 20 mph.

While the reports may depict a fairly good day for golf overall, there is still an issue. The mere 20% chance of showers would mean that almost certainly a cloudy day is expected on the greens. And while that may not be an issue during the early hours, it certainly would be one later in the day, for the course could be enveloped in darkness sooner than the round may finish, resulting in exactly what happened during the first two rounds—play being postponed to the next day due to darkness!

While the damage on Thursday and Friday was not too heavy, with only a handful of golfers needed to finish the first round the next day and only two for the second round, the same, of course, can’t be promised for Saturday.

If things go badly with the round being canceled too early on, not only will the play have to be pushed to Sunday, but if a substantial number of players see their play pushed, Sunday’s original tee times too will have to be delayed, resulting in perhaps the event ending on Monday instead of the weekend.

Only eight times in THE PLAYERS Championship history has the final round spilled over to Monday. The last time was in 2022, when the Friday round was canceled due to incessant rain. On the Monday that followed, Cameron Smith eventually earned bragging rights after beating Anirban Lahiri by one stroke. And in the worst-case scenario, THE PLAYERS could even see a premature champion crowned.

Could The PLAYERS Championship 2024 witness a victory without all 72 holes played?

Although the PGA Tour prides itself on its four rounds of golf, there have been instances where a champion has been declared for the event after just 54 (Round 3). The latest in that line was just last month, when Wyndham Clark was handed the trophy for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

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The golfer was in the lead on Day 3 of the event. What followed was the final round constantly being postponed and eventually canceled due to a battering hailstorm, with Clark declared the winner. And while it is unlikely, it is certainly not impossible that the same could not happen at THE PLAYERS. In what is perhaps a weird coincidence, this week too, Wyndham Clark sits atop the leaderboard, 4 strokes away from those tied for 2.

Could the golfer get lucky twice in a span of weeks with the same issue? With yet another round almost guaranteed to begin in just minutes, it’s certainly in no one’s hands but his own… Well, and the weather gods, of course!

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