SHRINERS CHILDREN'S OPEN

October 9, 2021

Lanto Griffin

TPC Summerlin

Quick Quotes

Q. After 72 on Thursday something's clicked, really good round of golf today.

LANTO GRIFFIN: Yeah, no, Thursday was frustrating, I played pretty well and just nothing good happened, so many putts felt like they were going in, lipped out. Just anything that could go wrong did. We were on the range yesterday afternoon and the fans turned on and the cut was at 5-under when we were on the range and I kind of had the mindset that to make the cut I probably needed the wind to blow. So I played really well yesterday and got a few, just got momentum, really, haven't had any momentum in a while. And so I think I told my girlfriend driving home yesterday that that was like probably a .05 percent chance to make the cut, when it started blowing 15 to 20 and happy to shoot 6-, 7-under. So, yeah, it was great.

Then any time you make the cut like that there's really two ways to look at it. One, you can come in just thankful to be here for the weekend and I tried to have the mindset that I'm playing well and I'm off early before the wind, fresher greens and if I put up a good number early on Saturday I got a chance on Sunday.

So front nine felt like it could have been, we were walking off and my caddie was like it could have been 59 today pretty easy. Obviously I'm very happy with 64, but it felt -- I haven't had an easy round, I haven't had an easy round in a long time and so it's kind of nice to shoot a low number and not have to stress too much.

Q. The wind did shift, it was still blowing, but to squeeze the birdies you did out of that difficult front nine did anything change on the golf course that allowed you to take advantage of it or was it, how is this golf course a little bit different today?

LANTO GRIFFIN: Yeah, it was a much more favorable wind today for the front. Like 5 and 6 and 7, 8, 9 was off the right. But then it made 10, 11, 12 really difficult. So once we got through 12 we knew we had birdie chances on 13. 14 actually played really hard. Yesterday or the first day I hit 9-iron to the same pin and today I hit 51 degree and hit it over the green and made bogey.

So it was, the wind's definitely pretty much giving us a 180 and the course is, obviously the scores are really low here, but with this wind it's not playing overly easy.

Q. Do you give yourself a percentage chance of how far you'll be back by the end of the day? Do you even think about that?

LANTO GRIFFIN: I would imagine 18- or 19-under will be leading, somewhere in there. I'm not even sure what the leaders are. I think they're at 14. So, yeah, I mean 4-, 5-under is a solid round out here. Somebody could get to 20, 21. But I should be around, I should be somewhere around 10th to 15th or so, which if I can get out there and shoot another 64 tomorrow that would be nice to finish with three of those.

Q. You talked about not having momentum for awhile, wanted to have an easy round. Have you been working on anything specific with your game?

LANTO GRIFFIN: Yeah, I've been working too much. It's been like new flavor of the week for the last year, different swing every week and sometimes every day. So we've been working the last couple weeks on just consistency and working on the same things. And that's what was so frustrating, Thursday I felt like I played great and shooting 1-over out here is like, you're done, like there's no way to come back from that. But I was actually in a really good mood yesterday, I had a flight booked for today and I was, I had a lay-flat seat to Miami, I was going to watch football and have a couple bourbons on the flight home. And then obviously -- but yesterday I felt really, I was in a good mood and I wasn't down on myself, which I have been, a lot of guys are. I played with JT Poston and he's hitting it great and feels like he's putting it good and we talked a lot yesterday we were just like, this just feels like nothing's going right. But we also know that golf's in stretches. So you'll go in stretches -- look at Sam Burns. I'm guessing his bad shots are okay and his good shots are great. And when things aren't going your way it's like a great shot's okay and an okay shot you're making bogey. So golf's a lot of momentum, a lot, it's big-time momentum.

I think 13's a good example of that today. We were, I had 220 front, straight down wind, but we knew if you landed on the green it's going long, it's hard to hold that green. So if I was in 60th place I would try and hit 6-iron straight downwind and land it on and it would probably go long and make par or bogey. But today we hit 7-iron short of the green, didn't even try and get it on the green and got up-and-down for birdie. So it was one of the things where things are going your way you don't even have to push the ticket as much because you feel like you don't need to as much, so you just make better decisions and it's just kind of a snowball affect.