Fred Couples hopes for longer stay in contention

The King of Cool is in contention at the Masters again.

Freddie Couples turned back the clock Friday and shot his second consecutive 1-under-par 71. He is tied for seventh at 2-under, five shots behind 36-hole leader Bubba Wat­son.

But is anyone really surprised? Not Couples.

“Can I win it? Yeah,” he said. “That’s why I’m here. Come over here (Saturday) night, and if I play well, which I haven’t the last couple of years, you know, then I’ll answer that question again.”

The 1992 champion posted birdies at Nos. 2, 3, 8 and 13. He suffered bogeys at Nos. 5, 12 and 17.

He hit his approach close at the 18th but missed the short birdie putt.

Couples has made Au­gus­ta National his personal Fountain of Youth in recent years. Since turning 50 before the 2010 Masters, he has finished no worse than tied for 15th.

The problem for Couples is sustaining his play over the weekend. In the top 10 at the midway point each of
the past four years, his only top-10 finish was for sixth in 2010.

The third round did him in the past two years, with 75 and 77.

“Well, I’m averaging 76 the last two Saturdays, which is not very good,” Couples said. “So my approach will be to average anything lower than that to bring my average down.”

The laidback Couples said the key was to remain calm.

“It’s a really, really hard course,” he said. “And when you panic and then try and do a couple of things because, oh, God, I was tied for the lead or in second. Now I’m in 12th place. And then you try and hit a shot, and it doesn’t work out. And you go to 18th place. You can’t do that. I mean, you’re trying to play the course and shoot the lowest score you can.”

At 54, Couples knows the odds are against him. Jack Nicklaus is the oldest Mas­ters winner, and he was 46 when he did it in 1986.

“A second win here would be … I have no idea,” Couples said. “I don’t think about it. I think about playing well and … when you start thinking about that, you kind of go crazy. But would I want to put on another jacket here? Yeah.

“But I’ve got 36 holes. I need to play better than I did the last two days. And I felt like I played really well. I’ve got my work cut out for me.”