Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. ? A two-hour practice session with Butch Harmon seemed to get Phil Mickelson through Saturday’s third round. But it might take a few more miracle shots like the one he hit on the 10th hole to get him The Players Championship title.

Mickelson was lucky to be in the left fairway bunker with 171 yards to the flag and a line of tall trees between him and the green. As he has done so many times, he courted disaster by trying to fit a shot into a 10-yard gap between branches. He didn’t even tell his caddie, Jim Mackay, what he was planning.

“It was a tough enough shot where I felt Bones would try to talk me out of it,” Mickelson said. “It was plenty big for a ball to fit through. I will say this . . . I played 30 feet right of that pin. I didn’t try to cut it over there. I thought I played the smart shot.”

Well, it worked, the ball trickling onto the green to set up a two-putt par. And when he finished strong for the second straight day, with birdies on Nos. 16 and 18, Mickelson moved back to within one shot of the lead that he held when the day started.

Mickelson called his 3-under-par 69 a “minor victory” because of all the low scores players posted on Saturday. He admitted that he felt himself start to press when he let some birdie chances slip by in the middle of the round.

“It’s tough to watch,” he said. “Before you even get out on the course, guys are making eagles, birdies, double-eagles and shooting 64s and 65s. . . . I’m going to have to be a little more patient (Sunday) than I was (Saturday).”

Another session this morning with Harmon, with whom he’s had two third-place finishes, would be a good idea. It’s almost remedial at this point as Mickelson tries to get through tournaments while he learns his new swing.

“It was very important,” he said of his extended time with Harmon on Saturday. “I kind of found my rhythm and found the shot pattern that I wanted. I certainly made bad swings, but I made a lot of good swings and that’s all I was trying to do. I was able to be more aggressive into some greens.”