Koepka, Tiger and Phil among Masters Sunday storylines

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Brooks Koepka has played this perfectly. Not only has he been the clear best player at Augusta National this week, but the luck of the draw has favored the four-time major winner. Koepka is now 30 holes from winning his fifth major after third-round play was suspended Saturday afternoon.

As the weather worsened Friday, Koepka finished his round with the sun still peeking through the growing gray clouds and his score at a tournament-leading 12-under. The afternoon wave had to face the windier and wetter (and tree-tumbling) conditions that forced the tournament to eventually be suspended for the day.

Koepka returned Saturday to a course that was playing significantly longer, colder and wet and began a third round that only lasted a handful of hours — six holes in the case of the leaders — and served to extend his lead before play was suspended again in the face of the squall. He birdied the first and watched as the field behind him struggled to keep up. By the time the horn sounded, he had doubled a two-shot lead over Jon Rahm and the next closest player was amateur Sam Bennett at 6 under.

The forecast should rise by about 20 degrees come Sunday, and with likely no rain in the forecast and a softer golf course, anything could happen over the course of the day. Yet there's something about Koepka and the way he's playing that harkens back to a time where he was the most dominant player in the world and it felt like no one else stood a chance if he was showing up to a major, let alone if he was up by four strokes heading into Sunday.

This week, with all the noise around the first major of the year featuring LIV Golf players, Koepka has shown up and neither acknowledged the noise or added to it. He has simply