Las Vegas, NV – Ryan Moore fired a 6-under 65 on Saturday to join Jonas Blixt and Brendon de Jonge atop the leaderboard after three rounds of the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open.
Moore, who went to UNLV and lives in Las Vegas, finished 54 holes at 19-under- par 194. He was joined there by Blixt and de Jonge, who both shot a 5-under 66 after sharing the second-round lead.
Moore will go for his second PGA Tour title on Sunday, while Blixt and de Jonge are going for their first tour win. The trio shares a 5-stroke lead.
Tim Herron (68) and Jimmy Walker (66) are tied for fourth at 14-under-par 199.
Jason Day and Jason Bohn both fired 64s to end at minus-12. They stand alongside Colt Knost (66) and Russell Knox (68) at TPC at Summerlin.
Moore made a steady move up the leaderboard with a birdie on the first. He got to 15-under when he birdied the seventh. Moore picked up another birdie at 11.
De Jonge had three birdies on the front nine to get to 17-under, but he tripped to a bogey on the 10th. What looked to be the big turning point was the par-5 13th.
Moore converted a birdie try, while a poor chip led to a bogey for de Jonge. Moore was two strokes clear at 15-under. He dropped in back-to-back birdie chances from the 15th to move to minus-17.
"Today was just a good, solid day. I didn't do anything amazing, but at the same time, I just did what I've been doing this whole week, just put it in play, gave myself a bunch of wedges, 9-irons into greens, and was able to convert a bunch of my reasonable birdie chances," Moore stated.
De Jonge bounced back from his bogey on the 13th with four consecutive birdies from No. 14. That gave him a piece of the lead with Moore.
"Everyone was playing well. When everyone is playing well, you can feed off each other, and I think we did a good job of that today. We saw a lot of putts go in," de Jonge stated. "Everyone played well, and hopefully we'll have more of the same tomorrow."
Blixt overcame a tough stretch in the middle of his round to grab a share of the lead. He birdied the second, but faltered to bogeys on the sixth and eighth to slip to 13-under.
The Swede birdied the ninth, but gave that stroke right back as he bogeyed the 10th. Blixt poured in five consecutive birdie efforts from the 12th, and also birdied the last from 28 feet out to grab a piece of the lead.
"They ran away a little bit, and then I got lucky. I got hot in the end and made some putts and was able to catch them in the end there," said Blixt, who played with Moore and de Jonge in the third round. "I'm really looking forward to tomorrow. It's going to be a lot of fun."
NOTES: Moore, the 2009 Wyndham Championship winner, owns a piece of the 54- hole lead for the third time in his PGA Tour career. He failed to hold the first two ... De Jonge has a piece of the third-round lead for the second time this year, while Blixt has a piece of the third-round lead for the first time.
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