Honda Classic 2018: Time, TV schedule for Tiger Woods on Sunday

It’s often said that the PGA Tour doesn’t really start to penetrate the larger sports consciousness until it swings back to Florida. That’s the stretch of the schedule that becomes prime pre-Masters prep. The weather starts to turn. The venues are familiar, for better or worse. Football has cleared the decks and it’s more likely to have your mind wander toward golf, even if it’s just a little bit.

The Florida swing has also, historically, featured Tiger Woods prominently and that never hurts for ratings. For years, Tiger dominated at both Doral and Bay Hill, piling up wins at those two venues, which were two of just a small handful of pre-Masters starts on Tiger’s calendar.

Tiger added the Honda Classic in recent years, when South Florida became his home. He’s succeeded at PGA National and posted some low scores there over the years, but he’s never won it in his limited starts. This year, he’s back at the Honda and will start the final round tied for 11th place. He’s seven shots back of Luke List’s lead, with a roster of names between him and List. So the odds of winning are long, but he’s got a late Sunday tee time on the PGA Tour and that should make this must-watch.

Whether or not you think he’s actually “in contention” — a wildly nebulous term that’s thrown around all the time — is not as important as the fact that he’s playing late in the day on Sunday of an actual PGA Tour event. He could make a run and come within a shot or two of the lead on Sunday. It could happen and he allowed for that possibility in his comments after his third round. He’ll just need help. He’ll need to shoot a 65 or 66 and hope the wind blows and causes some big crooked numbers in the many hazards of PGA National for those players behind him.

Tiger may not get in the hunt on Sunday. That doesn’t mean it still won’t be a fascinating and fun Sunday to watch. The way he’s hitting golf shots again, not robotically, but making pure golf swings is reminiscent of the artistry that he displayed during the most dominant stretch of golf ever played — not in results or execution, but it’s still there bubbling up more than it has in the past few years. It’s not perfect and he’s still making some sloppy swings, giving shots back. But Saturday was damn fun to watch as he caught a little heater in the middle of a round on a brutal course. There’s power, and artistry, and strategy. It’s all slowly coming back a bit and here’s hoping it sticks.

Sunday is another opportunity to watch that. He will tee off at 12:45 p.m. ET with Sam Burns, who was born the same summer Tiger turned pro. If Woods does roll in a few birdies early on, expect full-on mania again and the interest to soar as it did during the glory days. Even if he doesn’t go on a birdie run, just having him playing late in the Sunday coverage window should boost TV ratings dramatically. Golf is starting to creep back into the sports consciousness and it might be coming right at a time when Tiger is finding something in this latest comeback.

Here’s your media schedule for the final round of the Honda Classic:

1 to 2:45 p.m. ET — Golf Channel

3 to 6 p.m. ET — CBS

9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET — PGA Tour Live

1 to 2:45 p.m. ET — Golf Channel LiveExtra simulcast stream

3 to 6 p.m. ET — PGATour.com/CBS simulcast stream

1 to 6 p.m. ET — PGA Tour Radio on Sirius-XM (Ch. 92/208 and streamed here)