Paul Casey opens with 3-under, enjoys Spieth's show

Though pleased with his self-described “wonderful” round, Paul Casey couldn’t help but smile at what else happened around him.

Casey’s 3-under first round set him up well going into the second round, but playing partner and defending champion Jordan Spieth set the tone with 6-under 66.

“I played a wonderful round of golf, but it was great to have a front-row seat to watch that,” Casey said.

He is playing in his 10th Masters, hoping to better his career-best finish of a tie for sixth, which he set as a Masters rookie in 2004 and matched in 2015.

The Englishman got off to a good start with Thursday’s round of six birdies and three bogeys. For the second year in a row, Casey shot an opening-round 69 and briefly reached 4-under with a birdie on No. 16.

Casey dropped a couple of shots at the start of Amen Corner by going bogey-bogey on Nos. 11 and 12 to fall to 1-under. He got caught in the back bunker on the 11th.

“I didn’t do anything wrong. Committed to every single shot on the hole, all five of them,” Casey said jokingly.

He birdied No. 13 but wanted more. On the par-5 hole, he missed a 13-foot eagle putt and had to settle for birdie.

“(I) hit a wonderful drive up 13 and a little bit upset I didn’t win some crystal for an eagle,” he said.

After his birdie on the 16th, Casey got within one shot of Spieth before falling further back over the last two holes – he bogeyed No. 17 and Spieth birdied the 18th.

For most of Thursday, Casey didn’t back down from the challenge of playing with Spieth.

On Tuesday, Casey didn’t believe Kevin Na when he said Casey was grouped with Spieth and Bryson DeChambeau for the first two rounds. Casey took it as a compliment, then backed it up by shooting well enough to be on the leaderboard.

“I’ve been fortunate to have been paired with Tiger (Woods) and other champions,” Casey said. “I thought it was great today and I’m looking forward to that tomorrow, and hopefully I get paired with great champions all week. I feed off that. I think it’s marvelous.”