PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

May 19, 2022

Viktor Hovland

Southern Hills Country Club

Flash Quotes

JOHN DEVER: Good afternoon, and welcome back to the 2022 PGA Championship here at Southern Hills. We are with Viktor Hovland who put forth an even par-70 today. Really clean scorecard. That's major championship golf. I imagine maybe not exactly what you wanted, but it does put you in a decent position here one day in.

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, I would have liked to have made a couple more birdie putts. Certainly I had a few good looks that I didn't take advantage of, but felt like I did a lot of good stuff today.

And yeah, I think my game is going in the right direction, so hopefully I can kind of play more along the same lines as I did today and just kind of make a couple of key putts like Will and Cam did out there today. It was fun to watch.

Q. Of course the obvious question, Oklahoma State, you're so close to home. A lot of orange out there cheering for you and what was that like?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. Hearing a lot of "Go Pokes" and "Go Viktor" and a lot of good support out there, so that was fun. I was out of position a couple times, and instead of maybe letting that linger with the mood a little bit, when you hear people are rooting for you, it's kind of easy to snap out and refocus.

It's been fun so far.

Q. I was wondering your thoughts on the 18th hole. I don't know how much experience you have even though you've been around here with this course, but as far as 18, what kind of challenges do you see on that hole and what kind of a finishing hole it could be on Sunday, especially if the wind is blowing?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, it was really hard today. I hit a good drive and a 5-iron in there, two good shots, just to get away with a 4. I've played here a decent amount leading up to this week, but it seems like every time I came out here it was either a north wind or an east wind, which is very uncommon for Oklahoma this time of year. It played the full number today.

The drive I would say is not the hardest. In this wind you kind of want to stay on the left side of the fairway because if you hit it down the right you're probably not going to hit it in the creek, but you'll have to kind of cut something around the trees up there on the second shot, so you want to kind of hug the left side a little bit.

It's kind of tricky because you can end up in a downhill lie and either you try to hit it up in the air and let the wind hit it, or you kind of go with a low punch one and hit it in the middle of the green, and I kind of went with that strategy today.

Yeah, it gives you a lot of opportunities.

Q. Was there anything in particular that stood out about Will's play today? Obviously he has a good number up here today. Was there something about his game that stood out in your mind?

VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, obviously we know he's a good ball striker. He actually hit a few loose drives out there today, but out here you can kind of get away with it. But he hit awesome recovery shots and hit a bunch of greens out there today. I can't remember how many long putts he made, but he made a lot of good putts outside of 15 feet.

That's what you've got to do out here to play well because it's hard to hit it close on every single hole.