Playing in her home country, Brooke M. Henderson took moving day quite literally in the third round of the CPKC Women’s Open in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada on Saturday.
The Canadian led all golfers by shooting a 6-under-par 65 to move into a tie atop the leaderboard with Minjee Lee of Australia at 11 under entering Sunday’s final round at the Mississaugua Golf and Country Club.
Henderson was 2 under on the day and 7 under for the tournament after a bogey on the 14th hole. Then, she shot the final three holes in 4 under, birdieing 15 and 16 before holing out from the bunker for an eagle on the par-4 17th.
“Before I got into the bunker I was thinking, I can make this. It’s very makable,” Henderson said. “I was really happy with where the tee shot ended up. Had a really good line in the bunker. I knew I had to hit it soft because it was really fast. It was nice to land it right where I wanted to and see it go in. Definitely a great way to finish with two birdies back to back and the eagle.”
Henderson ranks 58th in the Rolex Women’s Golf Rankings, and is looking for her 14th career LPGA win but her first since January 2023. It appeared she was in strong shape to be the solo leader through three rounds. But then Lee also scored an eagle on 17, driving the green and hitting the putt to move to 5 under for the round and tie Henderson atop the leaderboard.
It was Lee’s second eagle of the day, as she also eagled the par-5 12th hole. But it was the 13 pars and many squandered putting opportunities that seemed to be sticking with Lee at the conclusion of her round.
“I felt like I was hitting it really solid. With the score that I had, I felt like I left a few out there,” Lee said. “So just going to work a bit on my putting afterwards trying to get the speed and the line right.”
World No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul of Thailand shot 2 under in the third round to move into a third-place tie with Japan’s Akie Iwai, who led after each of the first two rounds before shooting 1 over on Saturday.
Iwai’s round was off from the very jump. She bogeyed each of the first three holes of the third round before righting the ship and shooting the remaining 15 holes of the round at 2 under.
China’s Yu Liu and South Korea’s Jeongeun Lee5 are tied for fifth at 6 under. Four players in Grace Kim of Australia, Mao Saigo of Japan, Manon De Roey of Belgium and 15-year-old Canadian amateur Aphrodite Deng round out the top 10 in a tie for seventh, six shots back of the leaders.
–Field Level Media
