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8:20 pm

You wouldn't think that driving accuracy would be all that important at Augusta, but leader Trevor Immelman has been laser-like, hitting 38 of 42 fairways in the first three rounds to lead the field. Even more important, he has hit 41 of 54 greens and is tied for first in that category. On Saturday, staring down the pressure of leading, he missed only one fairway and three greens. No wonder Gary Player said his swing reminded him of Ben Hogan's.

8:05 pm

Steve Flesch is not a long hitter, but he has played the par fives extremely well this week. He is 8-under on the par fives, compared to 3-under for leader Trevor Immelman and 4-under for Tiger Woods. The two longest hitters in the field, Bubba Watson and J.B. Holmes, have been long and wrong too often; Watson is 2-under on the par fives and Holmes 1-under. Along with winner Zach Johnson's performance last year, Flesch's performance shows there is more than one way to make birdies on the par fives here, while Watson and Holmes show that being able to reach the green in two is no guarantee of a birdie, or even a par.

8:00 pm

Brandt Snedeker played in the 2004 Masters as an amateur, but this is his first time in the event as a professional. Since Horton Smith and Gene Sarazen did it in the first two years of the Masters, 1934-35, Fuzzy Zoeller (1979) and Tiger Woods (1997) are the only players to win in their first appearances as a pro. Zoeller did it in his first appearance overall and Woods in his third.

7:45 pm

By making a birdie on the 18th hole to shoot a 69, leader Trevor Immelman became the 10th player in Masters history to shoot in the 60s for the first three rounds (68-68-69 for a 205 total and a two-stroke lead over Brandt Snedeker). None of the previous nine shot in the 60s in the final round, and if the weather is as predicted Sunday (temperature in the low 60s, wind around 25 mph) Immelman isn't likely to become the first player ever to shoot four rounds in the 60s at Augusta.

Four of the previous nine have gone on to win the tournament--Gary Player (1961), Arnold Palmer (1964), Seve Ballesteros (1980), Fred Couples (1992). Five have not--Ed Sneed (1979), Craig Parry (1992), Ray Floyd (1992), Phil Mickelson (2001), and Retief Goosen (2002). Only Player, Palmer, Ballesteros, Sneed, and Parry had the lead outright through 54 holes, and Goosen a share of the lead.

Immelman has led or shared the lead through each of the first three rounds. Of the 15 previous times that happened, the player ended up winning only nine times. The ones who didn't--Harry Cooper (1936), Ken Venturi (1956), Bert Yancey (1967), Billy Casper (1969), Greg Norman (1996), and Fred Couples (1998).

7:30 pm

Phil Mickelson just didn't have it today, especially on the greens, where several misses in the four- to five-foot range consigned him to 75 that included a double bogey on 16 just when he had appeared to right the ship with a birdies on 13 and 14.

7:10 pm

Stewart Cink finished with a 71 for a 212 total to stand in sixth place and in all probability set up a final-round pairing with Tiger Woods. Cink can't seem to avoid Woods this year. They played together in the final pair of the final round at the Buick Invitational, albeit with Woods ahead by eight strokes, and squared off in the final of the WGC-Accenture Match Play. Cink hasn't had much luck so far; he shot a 73 at the Buick Invitational and lost to Woods 8 and 7 at the Match Play.

6:00 pm

For the second straight day, Tiger Woods made a par from the trees on the 18th hole, this time completing a bogey-free 68. It put him in fifth place at the moment, with all four players ahead of him without a major title on their resume (albeit all of them between two to four strokes ahead of him). It was Woods' first round in the 60s since a third-round 65 in 2005, 11 rounds representing his longest Masters stretch without a score in the 60s.

5:50 pm

Through three rounds, Geoff Ogilvy and K.J. Choi, ranked fifth and sixth in the world, have each made only three birdies. The lowest birdie total for players making the cut at the Masters since 1975 is three by Bob Lewis in 1987 and John Cook in 1998. With windy conditions predicted for Sunday, Ogilvy and Choi could match that mark.

5:45 pm

The best rounds of the early starters were 68s by defending champion Zach Johnson and Boo Weekley, both of them moving to 2-under for the tournament. Defending champion Johnson shot a 32 on the front nine. Weekley would be in the thick of things if he didn't have six three-putts on the week, tied for the most of anyone through this point. Johnson, by the way, is one of only two players without a three-putt through the present time (the other, Steve Flesch, still hasn't finished his third round).

5:35 pm

Three players who got to 4-under for the tournament plummeted from that point with double bogeys. Sean O'Hair pulled his second shot into the water on 11 to set up a double, Andres Romero (4-under for the round at that point) left one in a bunker at 16, and Ian Poulter double bogeyed 10 on the heels of shanking his second shot and making a bogey on the ninth. [UPDATE: Robert Karlsson did the same thing on 18, making a double to drop to 2-under. And Phil Mickelson followed suit with a double on the 16th hole.]