Collin Morikawa lifts his curse with an impressive record at the 2024 U.S. Open

Collin Morikawa finished his third round of the U.S. Open 2024 with a score of 4 under, significantly improving his position on the leaderboard. The result had additional significance for Morikawa, as he managed to put a negative record behind him.

The third round of the U.S. Open 2024 was the first bogey-free round for Morikawa in all his U.S. Open appearances. In his previous 20 rounds (including the first two of 2024), he had finished with at least one bogey.

Saturday's score (66) also matches Collin Morikawa's career record while playing the U.S. Open. This result allowed him to climb 37 places on the leaderboard and move into the Top 15, pending the end of the round.

Morikawa's career performance at the third major of the season includes five appearances with four cuts made. He has twice finished in the Top 10, with a T4 in 2021 as his best result.

Morikawa has played in 18 major championships, with 15 cuts made. He has nine top-10 finishes, including two victories (PGA Championship in 2020 and The Open Championship in 2021).

Morikawa, 27, won his two majors in the span of 11 months (August 2020 and July 2021), becoming the first player to win two different majors in his debut appearances.

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A look at Collin Morikawa's performance at the 2024 U.S. Open

Collin Morikawa played his first round at this year's U.S. Open with five birdies, but a bogey and two double bogeys defined his score at even par. His second round was even more unfortunate, with one birdie and five bogeys (4 over).

Morikawa's best performance at Pinehurst No. 2 came during the so-called "Moving Day." The American birdied hole one and then made nine consecutive pars. Morikawa then sandwiched par on the 12th with birdies on 11 and 13, and strung together four more consecutive pars to close the round with a birdie on the 18th.

The secret to his success during the third round was his effective putter in hand. According to golf statistician Justin Ray, Morikawa earned 4.84 strokes with his putting during the day, the best record of his career.

This was also considered by Morikawa himself, who had this to say after the third round (via TenGolf):

"I just made the putts that I needed to, I mean, yesterday I think I missed everything that I could have made and the first day was kind of a little bit of both, so it was nice to see putts go in and just kind of build that hopefully for tomorrow."

He added:

"I mean, look, even par that's... I was trying to get to that today and I'm very happy." [0:49 - 1:06]

His score is even par 210 for 54 holes. He is currently ranked T13, six strokes behind temporary leader Ludvig Aberg.