LIV Golf Dallas Round 2: Patrick Reed Takes a Three-Shot Lead as 4Aces GC Hold Off Two Heavyweights

Patrick Reed has been close on LIV Golf plenty of times. On Saturday at Maridoe Golf Club, the 2018 Masters champion finally found some daylight.

Reed shot a 4-under 68 in the second round of LIV Golf Dallas to reach 9 under at 135 and open a three-shot lead with 18 holes to play. Paul Casey (67) and Abraham Ancer (69) share second at 6 under. Tyrrell Hatton, Richard Bland, David Puig and Harold Varner III are bunched another shot back at 5 under, and Jon Rahm sits alone in eighth at 4 under. In the team race, 4Aces GC stayed in front at 12 under, four clear of Legion XIII and Crushers GC.

Reed Pulls Away

Friday's co-lead turned into something sturdier because Reed simply refused to give Maridoe anything. A run of three straight birdies did the damage, and LIV Golf had Reed hitting 78 percent of greens in regulation, the steadiest ball-striking in the field on a 7,533-yard course that punished anything loose in the Texas heat.

The context makes the number bigger. This is Reed's first 36-hole lead since joining LIV Golf at the league's first U.S. event in Portland in 2022. Reed has 11 top-five finishes and five podiums in LIV Golf, but no individual title in 40 regular-season starts. Reed was born in Texas, still lives there, and has never won a professional event in the state.

Reed did not pretend that history was invisible. "To get my first LIV victory as well as doing it in my home state would mean a lot," Reed said, before steering straight back to the process: stay in the moment and do not press.

Casey Closes Hot, Hatton Goes Low

The best finish of the day belonged to Casey. The Crushers GC veteran opened with a 71 on Friday and closed Saturday's 67 with three consecutive birdies, the kind of late burst a player wants to sleep on.

Hatton posted the low round of the day, a 65 that started with three straight birdies and dragged the Legion XIII star from 2 over to 5 under in one afternoon. That is a nine-shot swing from Friday's 74, and it pulled Hatton right back into the conversation.

Ancer matched Friday's 69 with a round that never sat still: seven birdies, including four in a row on the first nine, against four bogeys. One of those bogeys came with a dose of bad luck when an approach at the eighth hit the flagstick and bounced off the green. Ancer described a course with no margin. "If you're not in the fairway, you're going to struggle," Ancer said, adding that bogeys arrive quickly even from the short grass.

Golf Magic noted another layer to Ancer's weekend: Sergio Garcia currently holds the Open Championship spot set aside for the leading LIV player not otherwise exempt, and an Ancer win would put that spot in play.

The Teammate Slips, the Challengers Stack Up

Varner could not keep pace with the 67 from Friday and shot 72, which still leaves the 4Aces pair in the top five. Rahm also shot 72, dropping five back. Bland and Puig each posted a second straight 69, and Bland sounded like someone who knows what Sunday requires. "We've got to go get him," Bland said of Reed.

Four of the top seven, Reed, Casey, Bland and Puig, have never won an individual LIV event, so somebody new could be lifting a trophy, or a familiar name could crash the party.

Bryson DeChambeau, playing at home in Dallas, shot a second straight 72 and is not among the individual contenders. Joaquin Niemann bounced from Friday's 78 to a 66, a reminder of how wide the scoring range is at Maridoe.

4Aces Hang On, Two Heavyweights Close In

4Aces did not run away in the team race, but the team did not have to. Reed's 68 and a 71 from Thomas Pieters offset 72 from Varner and 74 from Dustin Johnson, and the round finished at 3 under for a total of 12 under. That is a four-shot lead and the best look at a team title the 4Aces have had in a while; the team has not won since LIV Golf London in 2023.

The two teams chasing are the dangerous kind. Legion XIII posted the best team round of the day at 8 under, with Hatton's 65, a 71 from Tom McKibbin and 72s from Rahm and Caleb Surratt, to jump to 8 under overall. Crushers GC also sits at 8 under after a 5-under round led by Casey's 67, with Charles Howell III at 71, DeChambeau at 72 and Anirban Lahiri at 73.

Behind them, the gap is enormous. Stinger GC and Fireballs GC share fourth at 2 over, and no other team is within 13 shots of the lead. Iron Heads GC had the roughest day, playing 16 over and dropping into a tie for last with Smash GC at 22 over.

Sunday's Equation

The numbers are clean: Reed leads by three, 4Aces lead by four, and the closest pursuers in both races have the firepower to erase that in one round. Reed's own advice for the final round was to avoid fixating on the 54th hole. With Casey and Ancer three back, a pack of four one shot further behind and two heavyweight teams breathing on 4Aces, Maridoe will have plenty to say before anyone gets there.

Our first-round recap has the opening day, and full second-round scoring is in the LIV Golf Round 2 recap (opens in a new tab).

Sources: LIV Golf (Round 2 recap), the Associated Press via FOX Sports, Golf Magic, Arab News. More golf coverage on Undrafted.

Photo: LIV Golf.