MEMPHIS – (Wire Service Report) – England’s Tommy Fleetwood, seeking his elusive first win on the PGA Tour, followed a first-round 63 with a second-round 64 Friday to take the lead at the FedEx St. Jude Championship, the opening tournament of the season-ending FedEx Cup playoffs.
Play was suspended in the afternoon with 21 golfers on the course at TPC Southwind as heavy rains flooded the area. Second-round play will resume Saturday morning before the third round begins off two tees in threesomes.
Fleetwood’s 13-under 127 total was four strokes better than Collin Morikawa and Akshay Bhatia. Morikawa’s 5-under 65 Friday included holing out from the fairway on the par-4 ninth for an eagle. Bhatia, the first-round leader after an 8-under 62, managed a 69 that included 15 pars.
England’s Justin Rose also was tied for second at 9 under with two holes remaining when the rains hit. Kurt Kitayama posted a 7-under 63 to finish at 8-under 132.
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who opened with a 67, had a roller-coaster round that included four bogeys and eight birdies, but finished at 4-under 66 and stands at 7 under. Scheffler was visibly frustrated throughout the round, from attempting to kick his club after an errant drive to talking to himself after a poor approach.
A win by the 34-year-old Fleetwood would give the tour back-to-back first-time champions. Cameron Young won last weekend’s Wyndham Championship, the final regular-season event.
“Maybe this weekend is the weekend,” Fleetwood said. “We’ll see.”
Fleetwood, in his 15th year as a pro, entered the second round one stroke behind Bhatia. Fleetwood quickly overtook him by recording birdies in bunches. They came at Nos. 2, 3 and 4 on the front side and at Nos. 13, 14, 15 and 16 on the back nine, building a five-stroke cushion at the time. His only bogey came on No. 18 after his drive found a fairway bunker and his approach missed the green.
From early in the first round through the 17th hole of the second round, Fleetwood played a 30-hole stretch bogey-free with 14 birdies.
“When you shoot two good scores, it’s easy to say everything has been going well, but I think for the most part I’ve been very good off the tee, put myself in position to have a go at the course,” Fleetwood said. “My iron play has been good and solid, and I’ve rolled the ball well. The greens are really true.”
Fleetwood has won seven times on the European Tour, his last victory coming in the 2024 Dubai Invitational. He has come close multiple times on the PGA Tour. Among his three top-10 finishes in 2025 is a tie for second at the Travelers Championship in June.
“Happy to put myself in with a chance over the weekend,” Fleetwood said. “I think that’s exactly where you want to be and keep testing yourself. Yeah, it hasn’t happened for me yet out on the PGA Tour, but I would much rather be up there and not quite get it done than not there at all.”
Morikawa is trying to put his last two events — the Scottish Open and the Open Championship — behind him. He missed the cut in both, but is prospering after 36 holes in Memphis with a new caddie, Mark Urbanek, his fifth of the season.
“It wasn’t good,” Morikawa said of his game entering the week. “I went back to the drawing board, had to figure it out, had to really look at it from another perspective and say, OK, I look at my swing, looks like this, how do I just get down to the nitty-gritty and say maybe I need to be in this position, maybe I need to look at some setup stuff. You just keep trial-and-error stuff.”
The top 70 in the FedEx Cup points standings qualified for the St. Jude. Those who finish Sunday ranked in the top 50 of the FedEx Cup points standings qualify for the BMW Championship, the second round of the playoffs to be held next week in Owings Mills, Md. The top 50 also will be eligible for each of eight PGA Tour signature events in 2026.
–Phil Stukenborg, Field Level Media