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THE RYDER CUP

September 27, 2014

AUCHTERARDER, SCOTLAND

GORDON SIMPSON: We're joined by Jordan Spieth and Patrick Reed. Just your general thoughts on the day.

PATRICK REED: We started out strong. This morning we started out great. Seemed like we had the most control and command of our golf ball, felt like we were making a lot of putts. This afternoon was just sloppy, on both sides. Justin and them even said it was sloppy on their side like it was sloppy on ours. It was one of those matches that, you know, it was tough. It was one of those matches hopefully you were able to grind out and get the full point. You know, unfortunately, we weren't able to get the full point but at least we were able to put some more points on the board with a halve.

GORDON SIMPSON: What would your assessment be?

JORDAN SPIETH: It was a solid day. Patrick and I made a great team this week. I don't think many people expected much out of the two of us coming in, and I think we showed them that we're going to be a force to be reckoned with for many years in this tournament. The singles is our team's strong suit, no doubt about it. Today we battled for a point and a half and we're upset about it. So you know, that just shows the competitiveness that we have, and neither one of us can really wait for that first tee shot tomorrow. I speak for Patrick, I'm sure, with that. Whatever happens, there's a lot of guys on our team -- a few of the best players in the world that didn't play a match today, and those guys are even more anxious than we are. We are going to come out strong as a team tomorrow and put this afternoon behind us, because as a team it wasn't what we were looking for.

Q. Will you be thinking that this is now your time to gain revenge for what we called the miracle at Medinah; that you could have glory at Gleneagles, because they came back from 10-6 over there and you can do the same thing?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, everyone in our team room believes that we can do that. They have to win, what, four and a half points out of 12 matches, is that right? It's hard for me to -- I mean, how do I say this the right way without getting in trouble? (Laughter) Yeah, we all believe that it's possible. Brookline was 10-6, Medinah was 10-6 the other way. Hopefully we get some good pairings and some guys out early to go make a move. We were able to in both mornings the last two days really, really gain some momentum by seeing red on the board early and I think that's going to be key tomorrow. Obviously that's going to be key tomorrow. But we're ready.

Q. When I met you for the first time at The Open last year, you had just come into Britain, and you were full of praise for the knowledge of the British crowd. Do you feel that again has happened this weekend?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yes, no doubt. I think the British crowd, yeah, they are the most knowledgeable in all of golf, very respectful. They were great. Me and Patrick and I were laughing on the first tee, some of the chants. And throughout the round they were cheering when we hit a good shot. You can't ask for much more. It's been nice playing over here and it's been nice to hear the faint chants when you know our team is doing the right thing. The roars are going to come. The Euros are going to win holes. So, yeah, to answer your question, it seems like it's right in line with what I said back at The Open Championship, and it just seems that way every time we come over here.

Q. For either of you, this is kind of the second day in a row where you had a nice morning session and within 45 minutes to an hour, there was pretty much all blue on the board. Was that any kind of a talking point from Tom to when you seized momentum in the morning to take extra care to try can keep it?
PATRICK REED: No, not really. Just one of those things that we go out and we try and play as good of golf as we can. You know, good thing we were able to get red early. Just, unfortunately, late, there wasn't a lot of red. But tomorrow is another day and it's singles matches and there's a lot of points left.

Q. Obviously the putt on 16, I think it was --
PATRICK REED: That was a great putt.

Q. Well, I guess that's the question. What were you thinking? Is this just golf or what was it that happened there?
PATRICK REED: It's just one of those short putts that you happen to hit a little timid, you don't really get a good stroke on it. When you hit a good putt and you don't hit a good stroke on a short one, especially with hard winds, that putt was probably like an inside left putt and if you don't put a good stroke on it, it's going to tail off, and unfortunately it tailed off.

JORDAN SPIETH: I shouldn't have hit it that far away on my first putt.

Q. For both of you, how aware were you that Phil at the end was watching inside the ropes, and what is that like to have a golfer of his stature as a support crew, basically?
PATRICK REED: Yeah, it's always great to have Phil out there watching. He came up to us on 15. A lot of the guys, they said they weren't going to come out and watch our group because we were rolling with it early in the mornings, we were getting our job done, getting our points. So he had the other guys go watch other players and Phil came out to watch us and, you know, tried to give us a little pep talk and everything. You know, seemed to start to try to turn some things around, and you know, unfortunately wasn't really making many putts, and like I said, it was just a very sloppy afternoon.

Q. Do you remember who the first person was who suggested this pairing?
JORDAN SPIETH: Captain Tom Watson.

Q. And when was that?
JORDAN SPIETH: Very early in the week. I want to say, maybe Tuesday morning before we even went out. I think we played together Tuesday, didn't we?

PATRICK REED: Yeah.

JORDAN SPIETH: Maybe. We played practise rounds from the beginning of the week.

PATRICK REED: Wednesday.

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, Captain said, "We think you guys would be a good pair." He wasn't sure for alternate-shot or best-ball and before the tournament started, we said, Hey, if you're thinking one or the other, I think we're the best best-ball team in this tournament. If you go statistically through it, on birdies and you chop it up into individual statistics, Patrick and I should be an extremely strong best-ball team. And we played great alternate-shot in practise, as well. The conditions were really hard today. It was tough to hit fairways this afternoon. This morning was calmer. You know, I think if the conditions stayed the same way, then we would have played a lot better golf. So would have Justin and Martin and it may have been a more fun match to watch. I don't know about more exciting but more fun.

Q. As rookies, what's the biggest thing or most important thing you learned this week that you can use next time in this situation?
PATRICK REED: Just play your game. It's still golf. You know, it's still a game. We're out here just doing everything that we always have done. You know, hit the ball in the fairway, try and knock it on the green and stick to your game plan. I feel like Jordan and I have done that really well this week and I feel like that's another reason why we haven't had a loss yet. We just stuck to our game plan and done what we know how to do, and that's hit the ball somewhat straight, knock it on the green and make a putt.

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, Rosey, Michael -- actually, Jimmy Johnson said it to me on, I want to say 17, walking to the last hole. He said, "Don't you think this is going to help you when you're in a regular tournament. Don't you think this experience will help you out there and win a lot of tournaments?" And there's some meaning behind that. I mean, very rarely do you get to experience this pressure, this adrenaline. Only when you're in contention. And to have it consistently round-in, and round-out, to feel like the back nine Sunday of a major; that's what it feels like. That's what it felt like in the mornings for us. That's what it felt like in the afternoon for us. To have that experience and to know that Patrick and I can capitalize on our opportunities, that's going to give us a ton of confidence going back to playing individual golf. You know, if we're paired together on Sunday, it might be hard and we might want to alternate each other's shots, but I think it's going to do us -- I think this experience this week is going to do just loads for us on course individually in the future.

GORDON SIMPSON: Thank you very much.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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