Monday qualifier Isaiah Salinda, Callum Tarren lead early Moving Day charge

LAS VEGAS – Callum Tarren plans to spend all of Saturday night the way he did Friday night. Eat at the same restaurant. Order the same food. Call it an early night, even if his Sunday tee time is much later than Saturday’s

It's hard to blame him. He might consider one tweak, though: invite Isaiah Salinda.

Paired together for the third round of the Shriners Chlidren’s Open, Tarren and Salinda combined for a best-ball 55 at TPC Summerlin. Tarren shot 62 (with a double-bogey on 17); Salinda carded a 63, his lone bogey coming on the 18th. The duo both finished 13-under, two back of the leaders.

“We just fed off each other, really. He birdied No. 1,” Tarren said, pausing momentarily, “and I birdied No. 2…3…4…5.

“It was super fun.”

It’s a common, often overdone, refrain: golfers playing off their playing partner’s energy. But if there were poster children for that contention, it might just be Tarren and Salinda. There were only three holes where one failed to make birdie or better. The two played quick, hardly had to wait for the group in front of them and watched each other pour in putt after putt. Tarren drained four birdie putts over 20 feet in his opening five holes. He made the turn in 6-under 29, adding an eagle at the par-5 ninth. Salinda took it from there, with birdies on the first four holes of the back nine, all with putts less than 15 feet. The last time a twosome was 17 under or better was The Sentry in 2022. Collin Morikawa and Talor Gooch combined 17 under in the final round.

There was a chance for both players to card sub-60 rounds on Satureday – Tarren with 59 and Salinda with 60 – after a pair of birdies on the par-5 16th. But Tarren slipped up on the penultimate hole, his tee ball landing in the center of the par-3 17th green that slopes severely right-to-left. The ball picked up pace, looked like it came to a stop, then kept rolling down into the water left of the green.

“I actually don't feel as though I put a bad swing on it,” Tarren said. “Probably landed it four yards left of where I wanted it to. If it lands four yards right, it probably trickles down right next to the hole.”

Salinda took 26 putts, but three came on the 18th green. He missed a 5-footer for par to drop his only shot of the day. Still, his round of 63 was four shots better than his previous on TOUR. It was the continuation of good form that began during the Monday qualifier. The 26-year-old Korn Ferry Tour player shot 63 on Monday to earn a spot in the tournament. It was his return to competitive golf after missing seven of his last eight cuts to finish 80th in the Korn Ferry Tour standings. He did it from the comforts of his newly adopted hometown. Born and raised in South San Francisco, Salinda moved to Las Vegas after turning pro. He practices at TPC Summerlin often. The former Stanford product was teammates with Maverick McNealy and Brandon Wu.

“We all kind of play for the same reasons, to have a chance,” Salinda said.

A top-10 finish would earn him a spot in the World Wide Technology Championship in two weeks.

Tarren’s route to a low round was a circuitous. He opened the week with a round of 70, about as high as he could have shot given his tee to green performance. He ranked fourth in SG: Off the Tee and eighth in SG: Approach. The bugaboo? He lost more than 3.5 strokes putting. That led him to make a change after two rounds, ditching the conventional grip he recently adopted and going back to the claw grip he has used for most of his career. It could not have gone better. Tarren led the field in putting on Saturday. He made 203 feet of putts and gained nearly six strokes on the field.

That will work.

“Today everything just went in,” he said.

Don’t expect any changes from Tarren or Salinda headed into Sunday. Tied at 13-under, they could potentially play again in the final round.

“Let’s do it again tomorrow,” Salinda’s caddie Bradley Knox said.

Nobody would be opposed to that.