Rory McIlroy Shakes Off Back Injury for Solid 2nd Round at Players Championship

Rory McIlroy put together an efficient, albeit unspectacular, second round at the Players Championship with a 71 that brought his two-day total to even par. 

It wasn't the blow-away performance McIlroy needed to put himself among the leaders, but it was a slight improvement from his opening-round 73 when he carded two double-bogeys and two bogeys. 

Here's how McIlroy stacks up on the leaderboard at TPC Sawgrass:

After Thursday's round, McIlroy acknowledged his back was causing him some problems on the course. 

“My back has got a little bit stiff again, I guess just from obviously building it up and playing through and then not doing anything for three weeks and then coming back last weekend and hitting balls for four or five hours a day,” he said, per the Golf Channel's Rex Hoggard. 

Starting the second round on the 10th hole, he breezed through it without much incident. He closed with a birdie on No. 9 after a bogey three holes earlier made it appear as if he would have to settle for an even-par 72. 

This is only McIlroy's sixth PGA Tour event of the year and first since the Masters five weeks ago because he got married on April 22. He's fared well with four top-10 finishes but has yet to reach the winner's circle. 

Speaking to ESPN.com's Jason Sobel, McIlroy did note he thinks his newfound marital bliss could lead to good things on the golf course. 

"There's not many question marks going on in my life right now," he explained. "I feel like everything's exactly where it's meant to be. And if you feel like that off the golf course, then I can only imagine that it will help you on it."

This hasn't been the banner performance McIlroy was hoping for. His scoring averages do get better after the first round, dropping from 71.25 in the first round to under 70 in each of the subsequent three rounds. per PGATour.com. 

It's a testament to his natural talent that he was able to work through the back issues from Thursday to shoot a respectable 73 and improve on that in the second round.

Driving Distance	Driving Accuracy	GIR	Strokes Gained Putting
295.0 yards	42.86%	55.56%	0.509

Even though McIlroy may have been navigating through back woes Friday, he improved from the first round in every statistical category with one exception. He had an average driving distance of 301 yards, driving accuracy of 71.4 percent, hit the greens in regulation 72.2 percent of the time and gained 0.48 strokes putting, per PGATour.com. 

If he is going to make a move up the leaderboard this weekend, his strokes gained with the putter will have to improve. It's the one area he failed to improve upon from the first round, yet he still managed to shoot under par Friday. 

Any potential rust McIlroy may have had coming into the Players Championship appears to be gone. Now it's time to take the next step with his performance in the third round to make it a memorable moving day.