THE PRESIDENTS CUP

October 20, 2000

Davis Love III

DAVIS LOVE III: It's obviously better to be 6-4 than 5-5, and get a little bit of a momentum going for the afternoon. I think being the last match of that segment and sending everybody out there with a better attitude than if we had been completely caught. It helps a little bit. The guys that didn't play well this morning are still disappointed, but it looks like they're going right out and going right after it this afternoon. I know that didn't sit well with a couple of the guys, like Jim out there pounding his frustrations out on the range. They'll come back and I don't know what's going to happen out there, but they'll be more determined, I think, than they were this morning.

DAVIS LOVE III: I don't know who it was up there, but somebody just played too slow. And we waited -- we got bogged down on 12 and got a hole open in front of us on 13, but then by the time we played 13, and were hitting your tee shots on 14 we were waiting again -- yeah, at 14, the par-5. And just sometimes in match play you have to prod guys along more than you do in stroke-play. And I don't think it will happen again. I think whoever is out in this first match is just -- it's hard, too, when you're playing an International Team competition, it's hard for the rules guys to say you're going to have to hurry up. It's hard when you're watching what's happening. But it was a slow day. The thing is, it's worse on the players than on anybody else because if we have to come back in the morning, it sure messes up a nice sleep-in morning. So we're all feeling it. We don't want -- none of us wanted to go slow, either, but something happened up there in the front and I'm sure they'll correct it.

DAVIS LOVE III: As I said, I didn't see who was doing what. I know we get frustrated in the Ryder Cup that there's too much conferring going on. And I've played a lot of matches -- I'm always frustrated with the conferring, because I don't -- I ask Phil a couple of times, and he asked me a couple of times. But you've got to play your own game. And I think it's all a little too slow. But there's a lot of pressure and things get bogged down. But, as I said, if the officials say, look, here's what we've got to do then we can do it, it's just a matter of getting pushed into it.

DAVIS LOVE III: Today was a lot trickier than yesterday. They're very fast and if you hit it 6 feet every hole, you play a lot faster. But when you hit it 40 feet, you've got two guys 30 and 40 feet away, it takes a while to lag them down there. If you don't hit good putts, you're putting coming back. I think the course was a lot of the factor today. You don't want to set it up where every hole has to be a birdie or you're going to lose the hole. But you don't want to make it so hard that you don't see any birdies and it slows things down. There were some key ones today. That would help a little bit. But the only thing is like alternate shot, if you hit it out there and the guy is waiting for the ball and he negotiation in and hits it without a whole lot of discussion you can play pretty fast. But if you both walk to the tee and you both walk to the ball it goes pretty slow. Same thing with four guys playing. If you talk about your shots it's really going to be slow, because our foursome-play on this course would be 4 and a half hours anyway with no discussion playing a tournament. So it's a slow format, but we just need to do a better job, especially the players. But after today it won't be an issue, with just one match tomorrow.

DAVIS LOVE III: He's right. We've just got to stay ahead until the end. We knew that we weren't going to stay five points ahead with all the points out there. If we could pour it on, we'd be lucky to -- you can't win every segment is what I'm trying to say. And we didn't win it this morning, and we would have much rather lost it 3-2. But they got back in it right away, rather than creeping back. And as Peter Thomson said yesterday, we lost the first segment before and have gotten that far behind and came close to winning. So it all seems to even out in the end in these matches. When you get on a run, it's easy to sustain it. Maybe we'll get back on our run this afternoon and jump back out ahead. But these are two very evenly matched, two very good teams and it's all momentum and who's making putts. And, again, I'm at a disadvantage, because I was the last match and I didn't see anything. But I have a feeling that the golf was a lot like it was yesterday and they just holed the putts and we didn't.

DAVIS LOVE III: No, I think there was a couple of very good holes that Phil sucked it up and I'd say 15, he made that putt after hitting it in there close, probably a 20-footer, 18-footer -- maybe 15. But anyway, he -- we both hit good drives after they hit bad drives -- well, I guess they hit first. We both hit good drives. We both hit the green. He hit it a lot closer than me. He said coming off the tee, he said we have to win this hole, because we need to make a birdie and take this hole and get 2-up. When he gets focused he does really well. He had a couple of times where he was a little sketchy where the putter wasn't comfortable. But when he did get comfortable he started hitting really good putts. He's playing very well. He's bombing it out there. I put a little bit of pressure on him a couple of times and we both played a couple of holes not well. I missed a little putt at 10, probably would have made the last few holes up a little easier. And he had a bad drive at 12, and I didn't make birdie at 12 either. And those guys made a bomb at 13. So it got a little sketchy there in the middle. Then we both hit some good shots coming in and got the ball in play when we needed to. We weren't -- again, just like my match with David, we weren't in command, but it always looked like we were going to win.

DAVIS LOVE III: I know Phil said this is the best team, we've got to get out and beat them. I was hoping he wasn't going to put too much pressure on himself that we had to win. And that that was their toughest team. You never know who the toughest team is. But they're the biggest names on their team and when you beat them or when you beat Greg Norman it stings them a little bit. And just like Tiger and Notah not winning this morning. That's a jab. It's not just one point, it's, hey, these guys aren't invincible. So I know Tiger is probably very determined this afternoon, as Hal Sutton and the rest of the guys are, but, yeah, the momentum -- sure they got back in it, but it all hinges on the next segment. If we come out and do well in this segment then that forces them back in on the next one, that they have to do very well in it. We don't know how it will turn out. But I have a feeling the singles matches always seem to be the deciding factor. We would love to win four or five matches every segment and have the singles not be important. But I think it will come down to who wins the most of those.

DAVIS LOVE III: It was fun to make that putt at 17, because you knew those guys were going to make birdie. Yes, that's fun. Would it have been more fun to be done on 14 and sitting up there to watch President Bush flip the coin? Probably. If Phil had birdied every hole, I wouldn't have been disappointed. But we're here for the competition. We're here to see how you handle pressure. You're here to see how you react to things. You get confidence from things like making that last putt. In fact, Lee said over there having lunch said, boy, you're putting good, and my wife went (indicating). Hey, I made the putt on the 17th hole that made the match. That's all I remember. I'm not dwelling on the fact that I missed a couple 10- or 15-footers. I said, hey, under the gun I made it. And that's why we're here is can you make them on the last hole. Some of the best putts that I go back and think about in your memory bank of good putts -- I'll never forget Crenshaw reading that putt for me at Brookline on the 18th green and standing up in the shadows with everybody standing around the green with both teams watching. If I can make that putt or I can make that putt on 17 today, that's going to give me confidence to go to THE TOUR Championship and make some putts. So, yeah, that's why we're here is to be under pressure. We'd like for the pressure to ease up by the time we get to Sunday, but it is fun to compete. You don't want to go out and have the guys bogey every hole and give you the match. But you want to go out and win it. I think that's what you're saying. We want to go out and win it and do it in an exciting fashion and not just cruise through it.

DAVIS LOVE III: I'd say it was probably -- the pin was 10 or so over that bunker, so I'd say it was 25 feet, 26 feet, somewhere like that.

DAVIS LOVE III: No, we saw him in Australia what Franco and Maruyama can do. They both played great down there. And we were just happy that Maruyama sat out yesterday, because he's been the giant killer for them. Anybody on either team, that's what I kept trying to say to Phil, he kept saying this is their best team, we've got to beat them. I said you know what, you don't know who their best team is every segment, it changes. I bet you that when they were sitting in that other side they weren't going, you know what, Stewart Cink and Kirk Triplett, that's going to be their best team. I bet they were looking at Tiger Woods or David Duval. So you never know. And I'm not surprised. Those guys are relaxed. They have great attitudes for playing the game. And I think when you get to this kind of format, the guys with the better attitude, the more focused and relaxed and confident players seem to shine more than the mechanical guys. And one thing is for sure, Carlos Franco isn't mechanical, he's just out there playing the game.

DAVIS LOVE III: We had the same -- we had a Hal Sutton repeat speech of we've got to get out and take it to them, don't just sit back and see what happens. We know how good this team is. We know that any let up, like this morning, they're going to come roaring back. And we saw what they can do in Australia and they know that if they get too far behind, they know what we can do on Sunday in singles. Nobody ever thought a team could do that, and we proved that anything's possible in this format, that we can come back from any deficit. So we know what we're up against, and we've got to just, as Hal said, put all our others in the water, don't leave anything in the water. Kenny says all you guys have to do is give me a hundred percent. And we're trying to give him 110.