Brice Garnett

The past champ (2018) arrived on the heels of six straight finishes outside of the top 45 but flipped the script today. He split 11-of-14 fairways and peppered 16 greens in regulation (4th). "We just have a lot of good vibes around here. We do a pretty good job guessing the winds, always putt pretty good on this grass, so it was a great day to start off a fun week." If this early lead holds then it would be his second time holding a first-round lead or co-lead on the PGA TOUR with the other being his wire-to-wire win at this event back in 2018.

Garnett steadied 14 GIR but it was far from stress-free today. He gave himself just three scoring chances from inside of 20 feet, with only one of those being inside of 18 feet. He made the most of a tough scoring day, though, with four birdie bombs converted from outside of 19 feet. He walked off the course ranked 3rd in strokes gained putting. "Drove the ball really well, kind of hit my places on the greens. Couldn't be super aggressive with some of the wind and the pins, and made two really good putts on 16 and 17 to finish the day." Garnett arrived with a perfect 3-for-3 record at TPC Twin Cities with all three finishes doubling as top 30s. 

Garnett bagged an early eagle (5 points) at the par-5 second hole which accounts for 50 percent of his round-end total today. He traded four birdies with three bogeys on the remaining holes. Steady striking has been the recipe for Garnett who ranks T18 in fairways hit and T33 in GIR. While his irons have been steady, based on that GIR rank, there is room for a go-low round if he gets really dialed in as he's pelted just 12 or 13 greens in each day. Garnett's lone PGA TOUR win came at the 2018 Corales (alternate-field event) and he'll try to add another alternate win to his resume tomorrow in Tahoe.

Garnett surged out of the starting gate with birdies on four of his first eight holes played, erasing a lone blemish along the way. He made the turn and added three more circles with one bogey on the homeward half. Steady driving was the key today, or at least made his task a bit easier. He split all 14 fairways today en route to 13 GIR. "It's a tricky golf course, and it's tough to get comfortable at times with the wind and then calculating 10 percent. We were just trying to get comfortable, and today the wind was down, and we took advantage of some really good conditions this morning." Garnett arrived on the heels of four straight missed cuts and finds himself just 162nd in the FedExCup race.