OAKVILLE, Ont. – Keegan Bradley had a local connection this week at the RBC Canadian Open, and it paid off in spades as he made a nice move on the FedExCup standings.

Bradley, whose caddie this week was Scott Vail of Oshawa, Ont. (a Canadian who was on the bag for Brandt Snedeker for his win in 2013 and his FedExCup victory in 2012) fired an 8-under-par 64 Sunday. It was the round of the day and moved him into solo fourth, his second-best result of the season.

More importantly, he moved to 44th in the FedExCup standings. He’s moving ever closer to earning a spot at the TOUR Championship, something he said he’s got his eye on.

“That's the goal for me the last couple years, getting to East Lake and kind of secure my chance at playing in all four majors,” he said. “That's a big goal of mine.”

Bradley, whose best FedExCup finish was 18th in 2013, hasn’t won on TOUR since 2012.

He realized he was in contention at the RBC Canadian Open on the par-5 16th tee, after a rain delay that lasted nearly two hours at Glen Abbey. He said if he went birdie-eagle he would have had a chance (he eventually fell four shots short), but knew he still had a great opportunity.

“No. 17 was playing really, really difficult, or was, when I came out. When I made birdie there, I was just… it was game on. It really was,” he said.

It was an up-and-down week for Bradley score-wise. He shot a 9-under-par 63 on Friday – tied for round-of-the-week – but was 10 shots worse on Saturday. He was nine shots better Sunday, going 63-73-64 over his last three rounds.

He said Saturday’s round was “weird.”

“I didn’t play all that bad, but I didn’t score very well,” he said. “But I hung in there, made a couple birdies coming in, which got me a chance to shoot low and made me hang in there today.”

The key, Bradley said, was his putting. He said the RBC Canadian Open was his best tournament on the greens since he switched away from the belly putter.

“It’s a big step forward for me, and it's so fun to be able to play with a chance to win,” said Bradley. “It's just something that I love, and it was fun this week.”

NOTES

Dustin Johnson's victory gave him a 527-point lead in the FedExCup. It's the second-largest lead at this point in the season since 2009. Jordan Spieth had a 1,720-point lead in his FedExCup-winning season of 2015. Johnson led by 296 points after the 2016 RBC Canadian Open, the third-largest lead on August 1 in the past decade. Johnson has accured 2,513 points in just 14 starts, an average of 179 points per start. To put that in context, a third-place finish in most events is worth 190 points. Justin Rose is second in that category, averaging 149 points per start. Only seven players -- Johnson, Rose, Jason Day (118), Brooks Koepka (118), Justin Thomas (117), Francesco Molinari (105) and Bubba Watson (103) -- are averaging more than 100 points per start.

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Matt Kuchar fell to 68th in the FedExCup standings after missing the cut at Glen Abbey. Kuchar has qualified for the past eight TOUR Championships. Of the 30 players who qualified for last year's FedExCup, there are 14 who currently rank outside the top 30 in the FedExCup standings. Eight of the 30 who played at East Lake last year are outside the top 70 in this season's standings: Kevin Chappell (76), Russell Henley (78), Jason Dufner (81), Hideki Matsuyama (86), Charley Hoffman (88), Daniel Berger (92), Jhonattan Vegas (121) and Sergio Garcia (132).

-- Sean Martin contributed.