Golf: Theegala, Bhatia and Rai make it to season-ending elite Tour Championship
Despite modest finishes at the BMW Championships, Indian Americans Sahith Theegala, Akshay Bhatia and Indo-British Aaron Rai have qualified for the season-ending Tour Championship beginning at the East Lake Golf Course on Thursday.
Theegala, who scored 76 in the fourth round to lie tied 48th, is seeded 11th, Bhatia, who carded 77 for tied 45th finish, is 26th for the Tour Championships.
Scottie Scheffler is the top seed and starts with a score of 10’-under. Theegala will be 3-under, Bhatia will be 2-under and Rai, who was tied 43rd after carding 74, will be even par.
The FedEX cup winner is determined by the Tour championships, which is the finale of the three-tournament FedEx Cup playoffs.
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The top 70 golfers in the FedEX standings compete in the playoffs with the field gradually trimed from 70 to 50 to 30.
FedEx St. Jude Championship and BMW Championships are the first two events.
On Sunday, Keegan Bradley won the BMW Championships of the US for his seventh TOUR title by a single stroke from Adam Scott and Sam Burns after a final round 72.
Si Woo Kim moved up from 44th to 32nd place on the FedExCup points list, two rungs outside the top-30 who advanced into the finale.
Korea’s Si Woo Kim fell just short in his bid to join compatriots Sungjae Im and Byeong Hun An in the FedExCup Playoffs finale, the TOUR Championship, despite finishing a season-best tied fifth at the BMW Championship on Sunday.
Im and An carded matching 71s to end their week in tied 11th and equal 13th positions respectively and safely advanced to the TOUR Championship at East Lake in Atlanta where the FedExCup winner will be crowned.
The 26-year-old Im, with seven top-10s this season, will make his sixth straight appearance at East Lake, and will start the TOUR Championship on 3-under and seven shots back of Scottie Scheffler in the staggered-scoring format based on FedExCup positions entering the Playoffs finale. He ranked 11th after the BMW Championship.
It will be An’s debut appearance in the TOUR Championship, thanks largely to five top-10s and six other top-25s. He will start the TOUR Championship on 2-under after placing 16th on the FedExCup points list.
Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama will be the highest ranked Asian golfer starting at East Lake after finishing third on the points list, behind top-ranked Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele in second place.
He will begin the week on 7-under but all eyes will be on him as to whether he can recover in time for the first round on Thursday following his withdrawal before the second round of the BMW Championship last week.