Englishman Tommy Fleetwood, seeking his elusive first PGA Tour victory, followed a first-round 63 with a second-round 64 on Friday to take the lead at the FedEx St. Jude Championship, the inaugural tournament of the season-ending FedEx Cup playoffs.
Play was suspended in the afternoon with 21 golfers still on the course at TPC Southwind due to heavy rains that flooded the area. The second round will resume Saturday morning before the third round, which will be played over two tees and in threes.
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Fleetwood's 13-under-par (127) total was four strokes better than Collin Morikawa and Akshay Bhatia. Morikawa shot a 5-under 65 on Friday that included a hole-out from the fairway on the par-4 9th for an eagle. Bhatia, who led the first round with a 62 (-8), shot a 69 with 15 pars on his card.
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Fellow Englishman Justin Rose was tied for second at -9 with two holes to play when the rains arrived. Kurt Kitayama carded a 63 (-7) to drop to -8 (132 strokes).
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who opened with a 67, had an up-and-down round with four bogeys and eight birdies, closing with a 66 (-4) to drop to -7. Scheffler was visibly frustrated throughout the round, from trying to kick his club after an errant drive to talking to himself after a poor approach shot.
A victory for the 34-year-old Fleetwood would give the tour first-time champions in consecutive weeks, as Cameron Young won the Wyndham Championship, the final tournament of the regular season, last weekend.
Maybe this weekend will be the weekend, Fleetwood said. Well see.
Fleetwood, in his 15th year as a professional, started the second round one stroke behind Bhatia. He quickly overtook him, stringing together birdies on holes 2, 3, and 4 in the first round, and on holes 13, 14, 15, and 16 in the second round, building a five-shot lead at that point. His only bogey came on the 18th, after his tee shot ended in a fairway bunker and his drive to the green missed the target.
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From the start of the first round to the 17th hole of the second, Fleetwood played a bogey-free 30-hole stretch with 14 birdies.
When you have two good rounds, its easy to say everything went well, but I think overall I was very solid off the tee, putting myself in position to attack the course, Fleetwood said. My iron play has been good and solid, and I've rolled the ball well. The greens are very true.
Fleetwood has won seven times on the European Tour, most recently at the 2024 Dubai Invitational. He's come close on several occasions on the PGA Tour. Among his three top-10 finishes in 2025 is a runner-up at the Travelers Championship in June.
I'm happy to give myself a chance to challenge for the weekend, Fleetwood said. I think it's exactly where you want to be and keep testing yourself. Yes, it hasn't happened for me on the PGA Tour yet, but I'd rather be up there and not make it than not be there at all.
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Morikawa is trying to put his last two tournamentsthe Scottish Open and The Open Championshipbehind him, where he missed the cut, but is thriving after 36 holes in Memphis with a new caddie, Mark Urbanek, his fifth this season.
It wasn't good, Morikawa said of his game before this week. I went back to the drawing board, had to analyze it, look at it from a different perspective, and say, OK, I see my swing, it looks like this, how do I get down to the nitty-gritty and say, Maybe I need to be in this position, maybe I need to review some aspects of my setup? You keep trying and correcting.
The top 70 in the FedEx Cup points standings qualified for the St. Jude. Those who finish in the top 50 on Sunday will advance to the BMW Championship, the second round of the playoffs, next week in Owings Mills, Maryland. The top 50 will also be eligible for each of the PGA Tours eight signature tournaments in 2026.
