JOURNAL SPORTS
PEBBLE BEACH, Cal. – Shreveport native Sam Burns birdied seven of the last nine holes Thursday in a charge up the opening round leaderboard of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, surging into second place, one shot off the 10-under pace by Ryo Hisatsune and tied with 2025 Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley.
Burns rolled in nearly 160 feet of putts Thursday as he needed only 24 putts after he found 15 of 18 greens and hit 10 of 14 fairways.
He birdied the par 3 fifth hole and the par-4 eighth before finding another gear. Birdies fell on the par-4 10th and 11th, then on the 13th to start a three-hole string, continuing on the par 5 14th, the par-4 15th, the iconic par 3 17th (on a 35-footer) and the closing par 5, when he got up and down from the bunker in the front of the green, draining an eight-footer to finish with a nine-under 63.
“I hit some weird shots (early) and told (caddy) Travis (Perkins) after No. 4, ‘I need to wake up, this is not good.’ I ended up having a nice day,” said Burns, who played with country music stars Jake Owen and Charles Kelly as amateurs.
“It was a fun day. We had a blast out there,” said Burns.
Golf Channel will have coverage today from 2-6 CT with CBS taking over for the weekend. Burns and his group, including PGA Tour player Corey Connors, tie off at 12:16 CT today on the 10th tee at Spyglass Hill. All weekend play will be at Pebble Beach.
The 88-year-old tourney is the PGA Tour’s first signature event of the season with 42 of the world’s top 50 players taking part. There is no cut as 80 pros will divide a $20 million purse, with the winner collecting $3.6 million and 700 FedEx Cup points.
Burns was five over and missed the cut last week in his second start of the season at the WM Phoenix Open.
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