Even if he wins, Furyk could lose

ATLANTA – Everybody oversleeps. And there's usually a price to pay.

But it's not likely to be $10 million.

Yet that might be Jim Furyk's nightmare.

Furyk has the lead going into the final round of the Tour Championship, but even if he wins the tournament on Sunday, he may not claim the season-long FedEx Cup and its $10 million prize.

Furyk overslept for the Wednesday pro-am at the first of the four playoff events, The Barclays, and in accordance with the PGA Tour's bizarre rules -- which have since been amended -- he was disqualified for the event.

If Furyk had played well at Ridgewood Country Club, he would've earned more playoff points and moved up the rankings coming into the season finale at East Lake. But as it stands now, he's ranked 11th, which means he needs to not just win on Sunday, but also hope that five other players don't finish high on the leaderboard in the 30-man field.

Furyk's dealing with the many sub-plots by just ignoring them. And he's not going to beat himself up about the mishap at in New Jersey.

"It's over," he said. "Honestly, it doesn't bother me. I was really mad at myself that week, but I kind of eventually started laughing about it. As much crap as I took, I had to start laughing about it.

"If I were to go out and win the golf tournament tomorrow and still didn't win (the FedEx Cup), I wouldn't feel awful about it. I just won the golf tournament."

Furyk's never had a three-win season in his career, but he's hoping this year "would be a good time to start." At 8 under par, with a one-shot lead over Retief Goosen and Luke Donald, he's the favorite.

At least that's what Goosen thinks.

"I probably feel that Jim is the guy to beat," the South African said after a second straight round of 66. "If I finish ahead of him, then I've probably got a good chance of winning."

Goosen knows of what he speaks because in two of Furyk's last three wins, he's held the South African off on Sunday. However, Furyk was somewhat taken aback when told of Goosen's remarks.

"It's a nice compliment coming from someone like him," he said.

Furyk's a grinder and has a well-earned reputation for not choking.

"We all like to pride ourselves on the fact that we believe that's true," he said. "If I didn't believe that in my heart or in my own mind, then I wouldn't be able to. The day that I don't believe that, it's probably time to quit."

Donald had the lead for much of Saturday but coughed it up with a careless double bogey on the par-5 15th, the easiest hole at East Lake.

"It was frustrating to give away a couple there," the Englishman said. "But I hit a lot of good shots today."

Donald has the most straightforward scenario if he's to win the $10 million: He needs to win the tournament and have Matt Kuchar and Dustin Johnson finish outside of the top two, a near certainty given they're tied 23rd and 27th, respectively, in the 30-man field.

But Donald hasn't won on the PGA Tour since 2006 and he struggled coming down the stretch in the final round at the TPC Boston three weeks ago.

For the first time this week, Phil Mickelson didn't struggle. At least for nine holes.

Mickelson, who needs to finish second to wrest the No. 1 ranking from Tiger Woods, shot 3 under on the inward nine. After a third-round 68 he's tied for ninth going into Sunday, seven shots behind Furyk's lead.

Despite his erratic driving -- he's hit only 15 fairways through three rounds -- Mickelson said his game "doesn't feel far off."

"I mean, a lot of the drives I've hit have actually been pretty good," he said. "They'd be in the fairways on a lot of the courses we play on Tour, just not out here."

Nick Watney didn't have much trouble finding the short grass or the putting surface or, for that matter, the bottom of the cup. Watney shot 63 on Saturday, making birdie on nine of his final 11 holes.

Watney said he'd been playing so poorly he asked his caddie to read his putts. "And he read them great," Watney said.

He described the record-tying 28 he shot on the back nine as "a great feeling."

"Everything kind of slows down, the hole is a little bigger ... I mean, it doesn't come along all that often, and you just want to ride it as long as possible."

Aussie Geoff Ogilvy, who stayed up 'til 4 a.m. watching the title game of the Australian Football League from Melbourne -- his underdog Saints drew with the favored Collingwood, leading to a replay next week -- shot a 2-over 72 to fall three shots back.

But the silver lining, he said, was that he'd be flying back to Australia this week and would be at the Grand Final replay.

Some players have trouble sleeping on the third-round lead. Furyk said he wasn't one of them.

"I sleep fine," he said with a wry smile.