After Thursday’s first round, the leaderboard at the 2025 PGA Championship was shocking. Jhonattan Vegas was on top by two, and the only past major champions in the top 19 were Matt Fitzpatrick and Keegan Bradley with long shots almost exclusively occupying the first two pages of the leaderboard.
As Friday’s second round got underway at Quail Hollow Club, the question was what big names would make a move to get into contention on the weekend and which of the Thursday surprises could find staying power. In the morning wave, the biggest move came from Max Homa, who tied Vegas for the low round of the tournament with a scintillating 64, going from 2 over and outside the cut line to 5 under and in a tie for third when he signed his scorecard.
Homa started his round on No. 10 and needed to improve significantly on that side after a 3-over 39 on the back nine to close out his first round. He did that and more, making a nine-shot turnaround on that side to shoot a 6-under 30 — a career-best for Homa on nine holes in a major championship.
Homa opened his day with birdies on the 10th and 13th, but it was his tee shot on the 347-yard, par-4 14th that proved he was going to make a real move.
That near-ace on the par 4 set up a tap-in eagle to move him into red figures for the week, and he backed that up with another birdie on the 15th to get to 5 under on his day going to the Green Mile. A pair of solid pars on the 16th and 17th kept him on the tracks, and on the 18th he got himself a bonus birdie by chipping in from the collection area short of the green after having his ball feed off the false front.
That chip in moved him to 4 under for the tournament, and he just needed to stay steady as he turned to the front nine to stay in contention. Homa executed that plan brilliantly, making two birdies on No. and No. 7 with just one bogey on the 4th after going long and short-siding himself, to get himself into the clubhouse with a 7-under 64 and move to 5 under for the tournament.
After his round, Homa explained in his TV interview that the difference from Thursday and Friday was just getting the ball to go in on (and from around) the greens, but the confidence he feels in his game was very high on both days.
“It’s just fun to finally put it together. I played really well yesterday, arguably felt better about my golf swing but just didn’t make any long putts,” Homa said. “To go low in majors, you need to chip in like I did today or make some long putts to kinda get some good fortune, so it was nice to show up today and get off to a good start after a bad finish yesterday. So, no real difference in my emotions, just feels nice.”
For a player that has struggled mightily with his confidence this season, this might be the most encouraging part of his performance thus far. He has been fighting his swing for more than a year but has been showing signs of life, starting with a solid showing at the Masters. Still, he was 170-1 at some sportsbooks entering the week and far from the conversation when it came to the contenders, but it wasn’t all that long ago that he was on the first or second page of the odds sheet and seen as a likely future major champ.
Now that he’s seemingly in a good place with his swing, it’s allowing him to handle the ups and downs of a round much better. It wasn’t all perfect on Friday — he went bunker-to-bunker on No. 16 and then long and left off the tee on No. 4 — but he didn’t let mistakes compound in the same way they had because they felt like one-offs rather than a trend. He got up-and-down from that bunker on No. 16 and bounced back to get that bogey back from No. 4 three holes later.
As he heads to the weekend, Homa seems to be playing and feeling better about his game than we’ve seen in a couple years. It doesn’t hurt that he has great vibes at Quail Hollow, with a win and two top 10s in his last four appearances at this course. Now, he goes to the weekend in position to challenge for the win and will have to handle a different kind of nerves and pressure, but after spending so much time grinding to make cut lines, he will be thrilled to face the pressures of actual contention instead.