Scottie Scheffler finishes with 3 straight birdies, leads Tour Championship by 5 strokes after 1st round

ATLANTA — Masters champion Scottie Scheffler might have had a roller coaster of an opening round Thursday at the Tour Championship if only he had been paying attention to the scoreboards.

Scheffler started with a 2-shot lead as the No. 1 seed in the FedEx Cup. He led by as many as 6 shots on the front nine. Then his lead was down to 2. And when he finished with three straight birdies for a 5-under 65, he was 5 strokes ahead of Xander Schauffele.

«I didn't know any of that,» he said. «I was just trying to go out and shoot a good number.»

Rory McIlroy's day at East Lake was far more wild. And he knew it.

A two-time FedEx Cup champion, McIlroy started 6 shots behind. He teed off in a downpour and hooked his tee shot over the fence and out of bounds. He reloaded and found a bunker. He missed a 6-foot putt and took triple bogey, and just like that was 9 shots behind.

And then he went rough-to-rough to make bogey on the next hole. McIlroy had only one par on the front nine and remarkably salvaged a 67.

«Not the best way to start,» McIlroy said. «The golf course is really gettable, so I knew there was a lot of holes out there that you could birdie. I knew my game was good. It was just one of those things. Not the ideal way to start, but proud of how I bounced back from that.»

Equally impressive was Open champion Cameron Smith, playing for the first time since the opening FedEx Cup playoffs event because of a hip injury that gets aggravated in soft conditions. East Lake wasn't quite a real lake, but overnight rain and the downpour made for a good walk spoiled.

He still managed a 67 and joined McIlroy at 8 shots back. They were a curious attraction because McIlroy has been the biggest voice for the PGA Tour amid its battle with