BERTHOUD — Kyle Westmoreland is a lot happier with his putter Saturday than he was on Thursday at The Blue Championship.

After Thursday’s first round in which the Air Force graduate shot 2 under, he felt he left shots out there on the greens. During Saturday’s third round, Westmoreland mainly putted great and shot a 64 to vault up to a tie for second place heading into the final round at TPC Colorado in Berthoud.

“It’s much better. Yesterday was good. Today (Saturday) was better,” he said after his round. “I think the more you play, like seeing greens, anytime you play in Colorado, you got a big old mountain over there staring at you. So you’re trying to figure out which way they’re breaking. They’re getting firmer, they’re getting faster. It’s definitely getting tougher out there, which is good. So that’s what we want. It should be a good one tomorrow (Sunday).”

The 34-year-old shot 32 on the front nine and got as low as 10 under on the day after an eagle on the par-5 15th and birdie on the par-3 16th put him on top of the leaderboard heading into the last two holes.

“A good tee shot, so everything starts there,” Westmoreland said about his eagle on the 15th hole. “Then I hit a good second shot, just rolled kind of back into the fringe and had a good look at it and went in.”

Even though his putting was better than Thursday, his results on the 17th and 18th holes stayed the same. On Saturday, with Westmoreland staring at possibly breaking or at least tying the course record, he made two straight bogeys to drop him to second place.

“Nos. 17 and 18 kind of have my number,” he said. “So we’re going to try to finish those a little better tomorrow. But it’s been awesome. It was a good day.”

Westmoreland is part of a group at 16 under with Joseph Bramlett, Noah Goodwin and Tommy Morrison. They are all chasing Ross Steelman who, fired a 65 on Saturday to finish at 18 under and hold the two-shot lead.

Steelman has had success at TPC Colorado before. He held a three-shot lead going into last year’s final round before shooting a 75 to fall out of contention and finish four shots behind winner Neal Shipley.

“It’s funny how golf kind of mirrors life in the sense that you oftentimes have a chance to correct your mistakes,” Steelman said. “And not like last year was a mistake per se, but it was a big opportunity for me, the biggest that I’d had in my career. And instead of kind of accepting and embracing the challenge and emotions of it, I almost tried to run away and hide from it.

“So tomorrow I’m just going to try to remind myself as often as I can that this is exciting.”

The leaderboard is crowded going into Sunday with 13 players within four shots of Steelman.

Littleton’s Chris Korte finished the day at 9 under, while former CU Buffs golfer Justin Biwer went out early and posted 8 under. Another AFA graduate, Tom Whitney, sits at 5 under.

Westmoreland, who already has a Korn Ferry win under his belt and has played on the PGA Tour, will have the advantage of playing a course he knows well.

“I just like playing in Colorado,” Westmoreland said. “The nice part for me, I’m pretty comfortable in the style of golf here, so I think it’s an advantage. But no extra pressure on playing here. If anything else, it’s cooler to be in Colorado and staying with friends. We’ve had dinner at their house. I’m happy that it’s 40 minutes away where we’re staying, so happy to get a later tee time.”