Sawt Falasteen - Dane Hojgaard shares PGA Puntacana lead with USA's Stevens

The 22-year-old Dane, a two-time European Tour winner, stood with Stevens on 14-under 202 after 54 holes at the Dominican Republic resort.

One stroke off the pace were England's Matt Wallace, Belgium's Thomas Detry and Americans Wyndham Clark and Tyler Duncan.

Hojgaard, whose older brother Rasmus owns three European Tour titles, seeks his first PGA victory after taking the 2021 Italian Open and last year's Ras Al Khaimah title.

He birdied the par-5 fourth, 12th and 14th holes as well as the par-4 sixth, eighth and 15th -- cruising as he did with a 65 in round two.

"It was stress free like the second round. Another day where I felt quite calm out there," Hojgaard said. "A lot of wind, but I had good control, so really happy with the round.

"There's a lot of birdies out there, but with this wind you can make some mistakes. It was all about the discipline mindset, hitting more greens and you can score out here."

Stevens, chasing his first top-10 finish in only his 16th PGA Tour start, sandwiched bogeys at 16 and 18 around a birdie at the par-3 17th to stumble back level with Hojgaard.

"On 18, I just hit a bad iron shot," Stevens said. "That was my worst swing of the day. I felt pretty good about everything else."

The tournament offers a prime chance for a first-time PGA winner with most of the tour's top talent at this week's WGC Match Play Championship in Austin, Texas.

H.Jarrar--SF-PST