The field in the no-cut 54-hole event is the customary 48 players. And the prize money payout continues to be notable, with $20 million on the line in the individual competition. The winner claims $4 million with everybody guaranteed to take home at least a six-figure cheque, with a last-place showing good enough to bank $120,000, which is just a little more than the equivalent of 18th at this week’s Valspar Championship on the PGA Tour.

In addition to the individual competition, there is $5 million up for grabs in the team portion of the event as the four-man squads continue to try to make themselves a point of differentiation between LIV and other pro tours. The winning team claims a $3 million prize money payout with the second-place team grabbing $1.5 million.

Here’s the prize money payout for the field in Tucson.

INDIVIDUAL
Win: $4,000,000
2: $2,125,000
3: $1,500,000
4: $1,050,000
5: $975,000
6: $800,000
7: $675,000
8: $625,000
9: $580,000
10: $560,000
11: $540,000
12: $450,000
13: $360,000
14: $270,000
15: $250,000
16: $240,000
17: $232,000
18: $226,000
19: $220,000
20: $200,000
21: $180,000
22: $172,000
23: $170,000
24: $168,000
25: $166,000
26: $164,000
27: $162,000
28: $160,000
29: $158,000
30: $156,000
31: $154,000
32: $152,000
33: $150,000
34: $148,000
35: $146,000
36: $144,000
37: $142,000
38: $140,000
39: $138,000
40: $136,000
41: $134,000
42: $132,000
43: $130,000
44: $128,000
45: $126,000
46: $124,000
47: $122,000
48: $120,000
TEAM
Win: $3,000,000
2: $1,500,000
3: $500,000

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Marc Leishman hasn’t had many opportunities in recent years to enter the final round of a golf tournament as the solo leader.

“There’s been a few here and there,” the 39-year-old Ripper GC member said. “But it’s been a year or two.”

He’ll get to reacquaint himself with the pressure now after shooting a second-round 66 to move to 11-under at LIV Golf Tucson. That gives him a two-shot lead over Sergio Garcia going into Sunday’s final round at The Gallery Golf Club.

“Obviously you play early in the tournament to try to put yourself into a good position, and I’ve played well enough to do my first part of the job,” said Leishman, who’s seeking his 14th career pro victory. “But there’s probably more than half the work to do tomorrow.”

In the team competition, Garcia’s Fireballs have slept on the lead as recently as last October when they won LIV Golf Bangkok. Unlike that tournament, when the Fireballs entered the final day with a seven-shot lead, their lead this time is much smaller.

Thanks to Garcia’s 6-under 65, Eugenio Chacarra’s 67 and Carlos Ortiz’ 68, the Fireballs are at 22-under — just one shot ahead of Phil Mickelson’s HyFlyers. Cameron Smith’s Ripper are another four shots back.

“Obviously super happy about how the team has done the first two days, even more so today. Very, very strong day,” said Garcia, the Fireballs captain. “We still have to do more of the same. If we think that it’s done, that it’s over, then we’re going to get passed left and right.”

Indeed, with three counting scores, the potential for volatility on the team leaderboard was on full display Saturday. First-round leaders Torque had the least productive day of any of the 12 teams and fell into a tie for eighth. At one point midway in the second round, four teams shared the lead before the Fireballs grabbed the initiative down the stretch.

“We’ve seen over the past 10 events how quickly leaderboards can change out on the golf course with a team,” said Oosthuizen, whose Stinger are seven shots back. “Five, six behind is not a lot from the team aspect. You need three guys to play really well, and hopefully we can put three good rounds together tomorrow.”

The HyFlyers had three terrific rounds on Saturday to shoot a cumulative 15-under, best of any team, thanks to Brendan Steele’s 65, Cameron Tringale’s 66 and Mickelson’s 67. The HyFlyers had a share of third place in one tournament during the inaugural 2022 Invitational Series but now find themselves with their best chance to claim a team trophy.

“We’re going to have to be really aggressive,” said Steele, who joined LIV Golf this season as one of six new members. “We’re going to have to keep doing what we did today because obviously the scores were really good today.”

Leishman also may have to be aggressive in order to fend off his chasers, as eight players are within four shots of the lead.

One of those is Charles Howell III, tied for third at 8-under with Tringale, Steele and Stinger captain Louis Oosthuizen. Howell won the season-opening LIV Golf Mayakoba with a final-round eight-under 63. Is there another 63 out there for the taking on the South Course?

“Probably not for me, maybe for someone else,” said Howell, who plays for Crushers. “I think the hole locations are really difficult. I think it’s really hard to get the ball close, the slope and the greens and all that. You’ve got to putt really well to do that because you’re not going to hit close very often. You’ve got to take advantage of the par 5s to do it.

“It may be out there but it’s going to be one heck of a round to do it.”

Leishman realises he’ll enter Sunday with a target on his back.

“There’s a lot of great players that are just behind me,” he said. “It’s a course where you can make a lot of birdies, and if you’re a little bit off, you can make a lot of others. So you can lose a lead quickly, or you can extend it.

“I just need to do my job, hopefully do as good as I can, and see where we end up at the end of the day.”

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Team Ripper’s Leishman opened with a six-under 65 at The Gallery South Course to grab a one-shot lead over Abraham Ancer of the Fireballs, Smash’s Matthew Wolff and Stinger captain Louis Oosthuizen. 4 Aces’ Peter Uihlein and Torque teammates Joaquin Niemann and David Puig are tied for fifth, two shots behind.

“I’m enjoying my golf at the moment … Playing with no consequences over the off-season kind of gave me a little bit of confidence with some of the shots I hit and how they turned out,” said the 39-year-old Leishman, who is seeking his 14th career pro victory.

In the team competition, Torque lead at 10-under thanks to counting rounds by Niemann (67), Puig (67) and Sebastian Munoz (69). The Spanish-speaking team is one shot ahead of three teams — Smash, Fireballs and Iron Heads .

Torque come off their first-ever podium finish, a third-place at LIV Golf Mayakoba. The next step for captain Niemann and his crew is a first-place celebration.

“I’m pretty excited to see what’s going to happen on the weekend,” Niemann said of Torque, the youngest of the 12 LIV Golf League teams.

The youngest player is the 21-year-old Puig, who played collegiately at Arizona State in Tempe before turning pro last year to become a LIV Golf member. Puig recently played a practice round with Arizona State legend Phil Mickelson and carded 11 birdies. He produced seven on Friday, tying for the most in the field.

“It’s nice to see David playing great,” Niemann said. “Pretty cool to see him scoring well. The practice rounds, you could tell he was feeling like home.”

As for the affable Leishman, he and his Ripper teammates — captained by reigning Open Champion Cameron Smith — are building the type of camaraderie they hope will manifest itself into team trophies. Next month, LIV Golf travels to Australia for the first time, with huge crowds expected for LIV Golf Adelaide.

“It’ll be nice to be able to play in front of home crowds in Adelaide, which is a really cool city,” Leishman said. “They love their sport. Certainly excited to get down there and just showcase what we’ve got with LIV.”

The immediate focus, of course, will be on the final two rounds of LIV Golf Tucson. Saturday’s tickets have been sold out. Leishman and the players chasing after him hope to feed off their energy.

“I actually holed a nice putt in 16 in front of the Birdie Shack,” Leishman said. “It was nice to make a birdie in front of there and get a nice cheer.”

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Phil Mickelson played college golf at Arizona State. Met his future wife Amy on campus. After graduating, they eventually married and lived in the Phoenix area for a dozen years. Their first two children were born there.

From a golfing perspective, Mickelson has been equally successful in the state. Named All-American for the Sun Devils in all four years, a rarity among collegiate golfers. Won his first pro tournament in Tucson while still an amateur at age 20 — another rarity. Won a senior event in Phoenix at age 51.

All told, seven of his 57 career wins have come in Arizona. And two of his three career-lowest rounds of 60 have been shot here, including 10 years ago when an agonising 25-foot birdie putt on the final hole circled the cup before spinning out, costing him a shot at 59.

“I really do enjoy the state of Arizona,” Mickelson said.

And now the World Golf Hall of Famer is back this week, leading his HyFlyers into the first US-based tournament on the 2023 LIV Golf League schedule at The Gallery Golf Club.

You could be forgiven in thinking Mickelson had heavy influence in making LIV Golf Tucson a reality. But he insisted that the market itself was easy to identify as a potential venue, so no strong-arming of the schedule makers was needed. Tucson has a long history of hosting elite professional events, but golf’s biggest names haven’t been in this city since the last matchplay event was held in 2014.

It was a vacancy too good to ignore.

The Gallery, Tuscon. LIV Golf

“I would like to say that I had a direct impact on it. It really wasn’t,” Mickelson said. “We’ve tried to nail down some markets that have always wanted and supported professional golf, and Tucson has supported professional golf, and then it got taken away.”

He did acknowledge the senior event still held in Tucson, in which he played before joining LIV Golf. But he cited the difference in seeing many of golf’s current stars perform.

“World-class golf — like the best players in the world, the Dustin Johnsons and the Cam Smiths and Brysons and Brooks and so forth — to bring that back to Tucson, I’m really proud to be a part of that, even though it wasn’t me just saying: ‘We’ve got to do this,’” he said. “It was looking at it in general and saying this is really a good spot for us to be.”

Tucson might be a really good spot for Mickelson to break through with his first LIV Golf win. He’s won three strokeplay events in this city, along with four wins in the Phoenix area.

The most impressive of those seven wins is the first one in Tucson in 1991 when he was a junior in college. The first two rounds were split between Starr Pass and Tucson National, with the final two rounds at Starr Pass.

Mickelson won by a shot over Tom Purtzer and Bob Tway. Purtzer was nearly twice as old as Mickelson, while Tway was more than a decade older. Youth — and oodles of talent bubbling to the surface — triumphed over experience that week.

The win was memorable but also significant in Mickelson’s progression as a golfer. He said it opened up doors and created opportunities that otherwise would not afforded most college golfers. And it gave him a valuable lesson in how to win tournaments at the elite level.

“I think the thing that I recall or I like to look back on was that I actually made a triple-bogey on the 14th hole of the final round and overcame that with the birdies on 16 and 18 coming down the stretch,” Mickelson said.

“Because you’re not going to play perfect golf all the time, and sometimes having to overcome some obstacles and having that be an obstacle to overcome in my first win, it was a big obstacle. It was a big challenge. I look back at that as a reminder to never give up and keep fighting, you just never know what’s going to happen.”

Meanwhile, his days at Arizona State provided insight and knowledge on how to manage his way around a desert course. Seven victories in, few golfers can match his track record in the state.

Asked what it is about Arizona courses that brings out the best in him, Mickelson replied: “I think there’s an elevation challenge, although it’s 3,000 feet, it’s not like going to Mile High in Denver. But there’s still a challenge of learning how to hit certain shots, distance control with the irons, that when you spend years here, like I did in college, it’s a lot easier to figure out. I think that’s a big part of it. But also, just being comfortable here in the way that people have supported me over the years helps me play my best, too.”

Indeed, the 52-year-old Mickelson will be a fan favourite this week. He tees off in Friday’s shotgun start on the No. 1 tee with playing partners Cameron Smith and Charles Howell III, the latter having claimed the season opener in Mayakoba two weeks ago. Smith, the reigning Open champion, won on his second LIV Golf start last season in Chicago.

Mickelson has yet to find himself in contention on a Sunday since joining LIV Golf, but he does come off a confidence-inspiring four-under 67 in the final round in Mexico. He said working with new HyFlyers teammate Brendan Steele — the two California natives have been close friends for many years — has helped dial in his driver. Meanwhile, he’s reciprocated by helping Steele work on his short game.

Perhaps it all comes together for Mickelson this week, 32 years after that first win in Tucson.

“It’s fun for me to see a lot of familiar faces that I haven’t seen in a little while,” he said. “It’s fun for me to get back here. It’s fun to feel the support. It’s a hard walk and you have to be a little careful walking in the desert with some of the wildlife going on. But it’s nice to feel support here.”

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The South Course at The Gallery Golf Club just outside Tucson is the venue, with the series playing on US soil for the first time this season after the opener in Mayakoba, Mexico, where Charles Howell III won.

While the star players are sprinkled throughout the shotgun-start draw, there are a few marquee groups that are sure to draw an Arizona crowd.

Howell is out on hole 1 alongside HyFlyers captain Phil Mickelson and Ripper skipper Cam Smith, while Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau — who have seven major titles between hem — tee it up together.

Laurie Canter again steps in for Cleeks captain Martin Kaymer as he recovers from a wrist injury.

LIV GOLF TUCSON PAIRINGS

10:15am start
1
Charles Howell III
Phil Mickelson
Cameron Smith
2
Dustin Johnson
Brooks Koepka
Bryson DeChambeau
3
Bubba Watson
Abraham Ancer
Louis Oosthuizen
4
Branden Grace
Carlos Ortiz
Lee Westwood
5
Talor Gooch
Matthew Wolff
Marc Leishman
6
Ian Poulter
Harold Varner III
Sebastián Muñoz
7
Anirban Lahiri
Kevin Na
Patrick Reed
9
Cameron Tringale
Henrik Stenson
Jason Kokrak
10
Sam Horsfield
Dean Burmester
Danny Lee
11
Scott Vincent
James Piot
Bernd Wiesberger
12
Richard Bland
Chase Koepka
David Puig
13
Sihwan Kim
Laurie Canter
Jediah Morgan
15
Eugenio Lopez-Chacarra
Graeme McDowell
Charl Schwartzel
16
Thomas Pieters
Mito Pereira
Brendan Steele
17
Matt Jones
Paul Casey
Pat Perez
18
Sergio Garcia
Peter Uihlein
Joaquin Niemann

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He returned to Arizona inspired by elements of Donald Ross’ masterpiece — elements that the 48 players in this week’s LIV Golf Tucson field will encounter.

Of particular note are the turtleback greens unique to No. 2. While larger in size than the Pinehurst greens, the South course’s greens do have a similar shape that will repel poorly struck approach shots.

“Many of the greens have very defined cupping areas that are relatively flat but protect the hole locations with surrounding slopes that roll off away from the putting surfaces,” Gallery course superintendent Mark Soto said. “The greens are all very interesting with multiple hole locations that test the best players, especially when the speed of the greens is at least 12 on the stimpmeter.”

The goal was to create a Ross-style course in the Sonoran desert. In addition to the turtleback-type greens, the holes were routed so that greens and tees are close together. Meanwhile, the course flows through the desert’s flora and fauna.

FACT CHECK

The Gallery, Tuscon. The Gallery Golf Club

• Previous occupants of the land include Native Americans from over 1,000 years ago. Artifacts and petroglyphs have been found throughout the Tortolita Mountains.
• There are several bridges throughout the course, including a 60-foot bridge at the 18th hole. The implementation of the bridges allows Soto and his team to leave the system of arroyos intact.
• Prior to construction, more than 650 native trees, 250 saguaros and many other cacti were salvaged to be re-planted post-construction. An additional 60,000 native shrubs were planted to create a tie-in to the surrounding fauna.
• The South course hosted elite-level match play events in 2007 (won by current LIV Golf member Henrik Stenson) and 2008 (won by Tiger Woods).

HOLES TO WATCH

No. 8: The 171-yard eighth is the shortest hole on the course, and the architect’s personal favorite par-3 hole. Plenty of risk and reward depending on the pin location.
No. 10: The 512-yard 10th plays as a par 5 for members, but will be a par 4 this week. It offers players a variety of options with a split fairway.
No. 4: The 496-yard par-4 fourth is one of just two holes on the course with a water feature, although it likely will not come into play for the pros. Even so, it’s arguably the South course’s best par 4 on the front side.

TURF TYPES

Greens: Bentgrass
All other surfaces: 328 Hybrid Bermudagrass

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