Singh, O’Neal & Jacobson Share Lead After Cold, Wet Saturday

• Tim O’Neal, Vijay Singh and Freddie Jacobson share the lead entering the final round of the SAS Championship.
• 138 is the highest 36-hole score to lead a PGA Tour Champions event in 2026, two shots above the previous high of 136.
• First-round leader Retief Goosen shot a birdie-free 79 on Saturday and fell into a tie for 29th.

Three men will go out on Sunday sharing the lead of the SAS Championship in Cary, North Carolina, after a wet, windy and cold Saturday flattened the scoring.

Tim O’Neal (70-68), Vijay Singh (69-69) and Freddie Jacobson (68-70) all stand at 6-under 138. No 36-hole leader on PGA Tour Champions has been this high all season. The previous mark was 136, set twice: by Zach Johnson at the James Hardie Pro Football Hall of Fame Invitational, and by the trio of Henrik Stenson, Ryan Armour and Y.E. Yang at the PURE Insurance Championship.

How hard was it? The second-round scoring average was 74.159.

Singh eyes a place among the oldest winners

Singh is 63 and a World Golf Hall of Fame member. He is chasing a sixth PGA Tour Champions title in his 193rd start, and his first since the 2023 Ally Challenge. A win on Sunday would make him the seventh-oldest winner in the tour’s history, at 63 years, seven months and 26 days. The six places above him all belong to Bernhard Langer. The oldest winner this season so far is Jerry Kelly, who was 59 when he took the ISPS HANDA Senior Open.

The Fijian’s form had given little hint of this. He arrived 57th in the Charles Schwab Cup standings, and his best result in 16 starts this year was a tie for 11th at the Kaulig Companies Championship. Cary has treated him better. This is his ninth SAS Championship, and he has three top-10s here: T2 in 2017, third in 2020 and T5 in 2023.

“I played pretty solid. I drove the ball well when I needed to,” said Singh. “It was a really tough day. I mean, I don’t like cold, and in the beginning when we started off it was cold, wind and rain, but I managed. My caddie did a good job, he kept me in there and telling me to focus, focus, focus, and that’s what you need in conditions like this.”

This is only the second time he has led or co-led after 36 holes of a 54-hole event on the over-50 circuit. The first was at the 2022 Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai, where he finished tied third.

Three tied at the top heading into Sunday. Who’s bringing it home @SASChampionship tomorrow? 🏆 https://t.co/JDdsIHHLUn

— PGA Tour Champions (@ChampionsTour) October 17, 2026

O’Neal in new territory

O’Neal, 54, has never before led or shared the lead going into a final round on PGA Tour Champions. His best previous 36-hole position was third or tied third, which he has managed three times. He finished T19, T13 and T11 on those occasions.

His only senior win came at the 2024 Dominion Energy Charity Classic, and this is his 104th start. In his 25th event of 2026 he has four top-10 finishes so far, the best of them fourth at the Portugal Invitational. He came into the week 27th in the Charles Schwab Cup standings. His record at this event has climbed with each visit: T27 in 2023, T17 in 2024 and T4 last year.

“Probably the coldest conditions we’ve had all year,” said O’Neal. “Yesterday was perfect, and then today we had hand warmers. A lot of different clubs into different holes today than we did yesterday. Tough, windy, cold, raining. Yeah, it was a very tough day, but I was lucky to finish the way I did.”

“For me it’s all about patience, one shot at a time, same type of thing,” said O’Neal. “Then just try to make some putts, that’s pretty much it. I guess I’m T-1 right now, but we’ll see. But tomorrow, same thing, just try to stay patient. It’s going to be cold again, so just try to hit a lot of greens and try to make some putts here and there.”

Jacobson’s 15-year wait

Jacobson’s only PGA Tour win in 331 starts came at the 2011 Travelers Championship. A victory on Sunday would end a winless run of 5,593 days, or 15 years, three months and 22 days, on PGA Tour-sanctioned tours.

The 52-year-old Swede has been knocking on the door. He has eight top-10s in 19 starts this season and arrived 20th in the Schwab Cup. His best senior result remains a tie for second at the 2025 Hoag Classic. He co-led entering the final round of this season’s Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai and finished tied fourth.

In his 43rd start, he would become the sixth first-time winner of 2026. The others are Zach Johnson, Boo Weekley, Scott Hend, Ben Crane and Vaughn Taylor at the Constellation FURYK & FRIENDS. Crane’s win came in the American Family Insurance Championship team event alongside Darren Clarke. Jacobson finished T17 on his SAS Championship debut last year.

Goosen’s bad day and the chasers

Chad Campbell and Søren Kjeldsen sit one back, tied fourth at 5-under. Neither has won on PGA Tour Champions.

Y.E. Yang produced the round of the day by three strokes, a 65 that was more than nine shots better than the field average and lifted him to a tie for 29th.

That is also where Retief Goosen now stands. The 57-year-old opened with a 65 to lead by one on Friday, but he failed to make a single birdie on Saturday and signed for a 79.

Final stop before St. Louis

The SAS Championship is the fifth and final points-based event in the Sprint to St. Louis presented by Compliance Solutions. When it finishes, the three biggest Charles Schwab Cup points earners across the last five regular-season events become finalists.

Those three head to next week’s Stifel Charity Classic, the first event of the Schwab Cup playoffs. The best finisher among them takes the $200,000 winner-take-all prize.

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