Brendan Steele birdied three of his last four holes and finished the second round of the Barracuda Championship with 18 points under the Modified Stableford scoring system to tie for the lead with Andres Gonzales at Montreux Golf and Country Club in Reno.
Steele, who lives in Irvine and played at UC Riverside, carded seven birdies and holed a 49-foot bunker shot for an eagle on the second hole while finishing on the front nine to tie Gonzales at the top with 26 points overall.
“The ball kind of went into the hole today,” said Steele, whose only PGA Tour victory came in the 2011 Valero Texas Open. “The course is in great shape. A lot of the time I see it a little more brown, a little firmer, and so it’s playing a little bit different. Ball doesn’t go quite as far because you’re not running out as much.”
“It’s golf so you never know what’s going to happen, but I feel like my game is in a really good spot. I was happy with how I played last week until Sunday. Basically, just didn’t hole anything on Sunday last week. But the game has been really good for a while.”
Gonzales, who has not won on the PGA Tour but captured the 2012 Soboda Classic and the 2014 Utah Championship on the Web.com Tour, made his only bogey on his first hole, No. 10, but then reeled off 11 birdies–including eight in a span of 10 holes at one stage–for a total of 21 points in his round.
J.J. Henry, who won this tournament in 2012 when it was known as the Reno-Tahoe Classic, made five birdies on the back nine and finished the day with 11 points for a total of 24 and was tied for third with Jonas Blixt of Sweden, who also made five birdies on the back and totaled 12 points for the second straight day.
Kyle Reifers sank a 22-foot eagle putt on the 18th hole and was fifth with 23 points overall, including 14 for the day, while David Toms, the 2001 PGA champion, was sixth after holing an 11-foot birdie putt on the last hole for a nine-point round and 22 total.
Rookie Patrick Rodgers of Stanford took a penalty stroke for hitting into an unplayable off the tee and another one for hitting into the water, but holed a 21-foot putt to save a double bogey 7 on the final hole.
Rodgers lost three points but wound up with six for the day and 21 overall to tie for seventh with first-round leader Zach Sucher (three points for the day), Jason Allred (10) of Pepperdine, Tom Hoge (nine), Chris Smith (10), Robert Garrigus (nine) and Will Wilcox (12).
