The Daily Wrap-up, Round 3: The 50th Bob Hope Classic

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Pat Perez shot a 67 on Friday to take a two-shot lead into the weekend at the Bob Hope Classic.

LA QUINTA, Calif. (AP) -- Pat Perez, his game steady if not spectacular, shot a 5-under 67 to remain two shots in front at the 50th Bob Hope Classic hosted by Arnold Palmer on Friday.

RELATED LINKS

Leaderboard: Round 3 scores
Round 4 tee times
Scorecard: Pat Perez
The Live Report: Rd. 3
Berganio happy to be back
Notes: Tidbits from the course
Player interviews
Photos: Rd. 3
XM Podcast: Rd. 3

VIDEO

Highlights: Rd. 3
Actor Pena makes hole-in-one
PGA TOUR Today

After opening with rounds of 61 and 63 to complete the first 36 holes at 20 under, unprecedented in PGA TOUR history, Perez was at 25-under 191 in the 90-hole tournament.

The TOUR record for the first 54 holes of a tournament was 189, shared by three players and last accomplished by Tommy Armour on a par-70 course in the 2003 Texas Open. The TOUR does not keep a record of lowest 54 holes against par.

Steve Stricker shot an 11-under 61 to move into second at 23 under. Taylor Vaughn's 64 left him another shot back at 194. Jason Dufner, who made it into the tournament when Anthony Kim withdrew on Tuesday because of a sore shoulder, stayed in contention with a 67 that left him in a group of four at 195.

• To read the remainder of this story, click here.

BERGANIO HAPPY WITH PLAY, BUT HAPPIER TO BE BACK
By Larry Bohannan, Special to PGATOUR.COM

LA QUINTA, Calif. -- Seven years ago, David Berganio Jr. came within a single shot of his dream of a PGA TOUR victory at the Bob Hope Classic. At 30-under par for 90 holes, Berganio fell victim to Phil Mickelson on the first hole of a playoff and had to settle for second place, his best finish on TOUR.

This week, Berganio is back at the Bob Hope Classic chasing dreams again. This time, though, the dream isn't to win a TOUR event, just to re-establish himself as a competitive and healthy player.

Plagued by serious back problems that have limited him to just nine official starts in the last five years, Berganio is back on TOUR for what he hope will be his first full season since playing 15 times in 2003. And he's back with a double-barreled exempt status. At the beginning of this season, Berganio is on his sixth consecutive major medical exemption. He has five starts to earn $346,342 to secure a full exemption. That money, or at least a large chunk of it, could come this week in Palm Springs, where Berganio put together rounds of 63-64-68 to be tied for fourth place at 21 under through 54 holes, just four shots off the lead.

• To read the remainder of this story, click here.

Friday's Best

EASIEST HOLE TOUGHEST HOLE The par-5 18th hole at Bermuda Dunes was the easiest with a Friday scoring average of 4.258. EAGLES: 3 BIRDIES: 18 PARS: 9 BOGEYS: 1 OTHERS: 0 The par-4 10th at the Palmer Course at PGA West was the toughest with a Friday scoring average of 4.313. EAGLES: 0 BIRDIES: 2 PARS: 19 BOGEYS: 10 OTHERS: 1

SHOT OF THE DAY ROUND OF THE DAY Actor Michael Pena became the fourth amateur to make a hole-in-one this week when he aced the par-3 seventh hole at SilverRock. Watch his shot Steve Stricker opened with a back-nine 30 before closing with a 31 to shoot a career-best round of 61 on the Palmer Course at PGA West. Check out his scorecard

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"I got two rounds left, you know, by the time I got to nine I had moved back and I thought I had two and a half rounds left and now I have two rounds left. So it's going to come down to the back nine on the Palmer on Sunday." -- Pat Perez on briefly falling out of the lead today.

INSIDE THE ROPES WITH THE PGA TOUR NETWORK
PGA TOUR Network correspondent Bob Stevens offers these observations from Friday's action. Listen to PGA TOUR Live coverage on XM 146/SIRIUS 209 or right here at PGATOUR.com.

With two PGA West courses now in the Hope rotation, fans can see the celebrities all on one site for back-to-back days, Friday and Saturday. Friday on the Nicklaus Private Course I learned that Huey Lewis has some serious game, though he claims a 9 handicap. Early in the round, he had numerous looks at birdie. By the way, he's a "free agent" for the upcoming AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am because regular partner Peter Jacobsen is recovering from another surgery. Huey said Jake would show him the Power of Love in finding him a suitable pro. The pros ought to have Jake on speed dial for this opportunity.

What do the pros talk about with their celebrity amateur pals during the long rounds at the Hope? Rich Beem, in between his 65 shots on Friday, was regaled with stories from rocker Alice Cooper about, what else, golf. Cooper told Beem he'd love to design a "haunted" golf course, with terrifying creatures behind the trees and in the deep rough and the weeds. Like he has to make golf even harder?

The 17th at the Palmer Private Course is one of the signature holes at PGA West, wedged between thousand-foot cliffs of the Santa Rosa Mountains and the All-American Canal, but the 17th at the Nicklaus Private Course might be more diabolical. A giant mound 25 feet high sits front and right of the green and singer/songwriter Stephen Stills almost fell over backwards trying to clear it with a wedge Friday. The hole's nickname? Volcano. So far, nobody's blown up after playing it.

What the top finishers said...

Player Position Score Comment Pat Perez 1st 25 under "I'm just going to try to go as low as I can and make a lot of putts. I'm not going to worry about a number. If I play great and I come up short, I come up short. But I'm not going to worry about a number or anything the other guys are doing, I can only do what I can control." Steve Stricker 2nd 23 under "For the most part you got to put your foot on the pedal and try to make as many birdies as you can and you know guys are going to do that, they're just going to keep making birdies, so you got to, if you're going to want to keep up you got to do the same." Vaughn Taylor 3rd 22 under "Sometimes we play such difficult courses and difficult conditions and it's good to have a change of pace where you feel like you can just go out there and aim at flags and make birdies and just have fun."

Read full interview transcripts

Pat Perez Steve Stricker Vaughn Taylor Full archive

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THIRD-ROUND NOTEBOOK: BOB HOPE CLASSIC
By Mark Stevens, PGA TOUR Staff

LA QUINTA, Calif. -- Playing in his 198th PGA TOUR event, Pat Perez has held the third-round lead once in his TOUR career. In that event, Perez finished second at the 2002 AT&T Pebble Beach.

• Perez stands at 25-under 191 after the third round, which is his 600th career round on TOUR. Perez's previous low 54-hole total was a 198 set at the 2004 Valero Texas Open. He is looking for his first TOUR victory and has a pair of second-place finishes, which both came in 2002.

• Steve Stricker matched the previous tournament record with a 54-hole total of 193 held by Joe Durant (2001) and Joe Ogilvie (2005), but it was broken later in the day by Perez, who finished with a 191.

• To read the remainder of this story, click here.