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THE RYDER CUP

October 1, 2016

Davis Love III

Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

JOHN DEVER: Pleased to be joined by United States Ryder Cup Captain Davis Love III.

Like yesterday, I'm going to ask you a couple questions. First question will be just your thoughts on the day and how the switch flipped a little bit there this afternoon, and then your thoughts, initial thoughts on tomorrow's pairings. So maybe talk about today first.

DAVIS LOVE III: Obviously a great day. We had a great start yesterday, a great finish today. So all in all, it was a great two days for us. I keep saying it over and over again in every interview: Our team played great for two days, and The European Team played great for two days. We had a lot of tough matches. I saw more birdies in the groups that I was watching, I saw more birdies than I think I've ever seen. It was an unbelievable atmosphere out there and a lot of great golf.

And then the matchups, no matter how we put them out there and no matter how they put them out there, it was going to be great matches. There's so many guys, I know they had a lot of new guys, but some of them played incredibly well. Our guys top to bottom, playing very, very well.

As I said before, it's hard to sit guys out. Now I don't have to sit anybody out, so I'm excited to not have to make any of those calls and phone calls anymore.

Q. At ten past 5:00 this afternoon, it was 6 1/2 to 6 1/2; did you say anything to the last three pairings or make any comments about what to do at their position?
DAVIS LOVE III: No, I'm always relying on my, I keep saying assistant vice captains, it says on their cart. I keep relying on them to tell me where to go, basically.

We ended up at the last minute obviously with Bubba, so we have a lot of coverage. We have a lot of guys out there supporting. So we started off the week with me being on the tee for the first four matches, and then racing out to the fourth hole to be on the first par 3 and start getting clubs, because I could give advice. Obviously that worked the first match, so we said we'd better stick with it.

The only deviation I did today was I feel like I ought to start walking with the Koepka and Dustin Johnson match, the first match off. I wanted to see the battle of the bombers. And Thomas BjÃ¶rn and I were enjoying saying that they hit it a lot farther than I ever did (laughing). So it was fun to watch starting off.

Then I got out to 4 and I parked it there. So I missed some antics, I guess, on the first tee and some good songs, and missed my guys teeing off.

But I felt better walking off with those guys and seeing how the course was playing. And then it was just fun to keep shifting to the same spot. I would shift to No. 8, and then I would shift over to the next par 3. We had a couple little things come up in the back nine where I got pulled off of standing on the par 3s, but then we had some close matches, so I would just say, which one do you think I ought to go watch.

But obviously Tiger's watched the same guys play all week, and Tom Lehman's watched the same guys play all week. So I'm just kind of filling holes and really making pairings. That was my big job and it was a hard job, make the pairings and sit guys out under the time crunch.

We were almost late today, we were so last-minute for the afternoon pairings.

Q. I believe I saw a report that Tiger talked you into sending Jordan and Patrick out for the afternoon; is that true and could you share with us that conversation?
DAVIS LOVE III: We had a lot of scenarios. These days with the radio is great, but then with text messaging, everybody was texting me their lineup. We started last night and then this last session, we had a plan. Here is all the options, and Tiger likes to say, Plan A and Plan B.

We got a little panicky there before we had to turn them in, because everybody had a different idea. And I just kept reminding them that there was four guys sitting back in the clubhouse that were ready to play. And when it came right down to it, Phil made an unbelievably good call. I was waiting till Phil got done with his match, and it kind of made the guys back in the clubhouse a little bit nervous. But texting made it good.

But we all kind of had a little bit different idea. Even my son threw a lineup out, he's my cart driver, and he says, "Here's a lineup."

I finally just said to Tiger, "Are we playing them or are we sitting them?"

He said, "No, you have to send them back out there, they are playing so well."

So what we've been trying to do was the four teams we thought were the best and we trusted the most, we would send out there. Fortunately, we ended up with getting everybody out there both days, which was good.

Q. It's no surprise with the Europeans down three, that Darren would top-load his team going out. Did you throw Patrick and Jordan near the top in anticipation of him giving you a really heavyweight start, and you wanted to have somebody that strong at that position, as well?
DAVIS LOVE III: Yeah, I had -- the six of us sat way back in the back of the locker room and talked about it for awhile. We've got, as we've been talking for the last year, we've got stats guys that tell us what's usually happened.

I've obviously been around a lot of teams that, no secret, that they were going to load the boat. So our problem, again, was we say, all right, we're going to put the six guys out that are playing really well. Well, we've got 12 that are playing really well, so we didn't know what to do. Look at Dustin Johnson at 9, he made a pile of birdies today. Just his record might not look as good.

But yeah, we had guys that wanted to get going, guys that wanted a little more time, guys that wanted to play close to each other.

But we got what we expected from Darren, and I'm sure he didn't expect anything different from us.

Q. Patrick and Rory have sort of been stars this week for both sides. But with the way Patrick is playing right now, how confident are you in him regardless of who his opponent was going to be tomorrow?
DAVIS LOVE III: Confident in all 12 of our guys. They have all done what they have asked -- what I've asked them to do incredibly well. They are all confident. They all want to play.

But Patrick, I told Ian Poulter back in 2012 that he was built for The Ryder Cup, and I think Patrick Reed is built for The Ryder Cup, too. He's got that attitude.

Obviously that's going to be a fun match to watch in two of the best players in the game going at it. But you just go down the list, there's great match after great match after great match. It's going to be fun to watch.

Q. Beyond the J.B. and Ryan getting a point in that last match, can you talk about the momentum of winning that last match and carrying it over to Sunday like you've seen in the past?
DAVIS LOVE III: Well, it's nice to have a good day. It's great to say, oh, you guys play -- what I said last night, you guys played really well all day, but obviously there was a little bit of a letdown feeling when we went back to the hotel. Even though we were two ahead, a little bit of the air went out of the balloon even though we played well all day.

And you could tell Dustin Johnson, well, you played a great match; I watched you. You made a ton of birdies. You played awesome. But he still didn't win, you know, and he still had that feeling of, I wish I would have won that point for my team.

It's nice to go in on a high, but as I said, all but two of us have been on teams before, and we know the deal; that tomorrow is extremely important. There's still 12 points to be played, and you just can't get off the game plan, and just keep grinding it out for one more day.

Q. This has been -- everything about this team has been so forward-thinking from the get-go. Is there any point in bringing up Medinah tonight, and if not, why not?
DAVIS LOVE III: Me bringing it up? In the team room?

No, we keep looking forward. But trust me, the six captains, we talk about it, because we've learned -- we've brought up every year from, well, I don't know how far back our stats go on The European Team. But yeah, that's our job, is to look at the stats and figure out a lineup, think about -- we got slowed down on the pairings tonight because we got guys that played on a lot of teams sitting there going, remember when we did this and remember when we did that.

Sure, 2008, 2012, 2012, 2014 were all talked about, but that's our job. That's the reason why we're the captains. That's the reason why those guys said, I will come and help, is because they have experience. So yeah, we talked about it, and we threw a lineup out there based on that.

I'll never forget the conversation Darren Clarke and I had Sunday night at Medinah on the back porch of the hotel. He and I will have another conversation about this lineup, you know, no matter what the outcome is.

We've seen it before, and we use that experience to our advantage, and you know, hopefully every one of those 12 matches will just go play their match and try to win their point, do the best they can for the team.

JOHN DEVER: United States Ryder Cup Captain, Davis Love, thank you.

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