Henrik Stenson steady, but falls back in third round at Masters

Henrik Stenson put together another solid round Saturday, but his placement on the leaderboard suffered from the result of one simple fact.

“I made a lot of par saves when I had to, and I'm just not making enough birdies to challenge the best,” Stenson said.

The 42-year-old Masters Tournament veteran shot 2-under-par 70 in the third round to sit alone in fifth place at 7-under. With leader Patrick Reed, and Rory McIlroy, Rickie Fowler and Jon Rahm going low, it wasn’t enough to keep his place in third entering the day.

“Today it was a challenge to climb up the leaderboard, and that was kind of the sad letdown this week,” Stenson said. “Too many unforced errors earlier. Didn't really feel like I hit that many poor shots today, but I'm just not quite getting it close enough, and I can't challenge off the tee the way I would have liked to either.”

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Stenson posted birdies on Nos. 7, 8 and 15 to answer a bogey on the par-5 second hole, but pars the rest of the way meant getting passed by Fowler and Rahm.

The highlight came on 7, where he holed his shot from a front bunker to produce a calm fist pump. He added a birdie on No. 8 by hitting his pitch close and making the putt.

It was a quiet, steady round full of pars from there. He struggled getting close on approach shots to leave makeable putts, and the result was a lack of birdies to make a charge.

The exception came on No. 15, where he chipped to six feet and made the putt. Aside from that, it was a second nine full of two-putt pars, summed up on No. 18 when he lagged a 49-foot effort to four feet.

“I feel like I'm going to go out and try and finish with a solid round tomorrow, hopefully,” he said. “I think I'm a bit too far back, but we're going to come here tomorrow and keep on trying.”