PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

May 20, 2022

Matt Kuchar

Southern Hills Country Club

Flash Quotes

Q. I saw you going down 1 toweling off today. It was hot out there.

MATT KUCHAR: It was. We had a breeze for half of it and had no breeze for the other half. Yeah, it was good preparation after last week. Last week was really hot in Dallas.

Q. What did you make of the day? What were your impressions of what you got out of that?

MATT KUCHAR: Always a frustrating bogey on the last. I was even par with kind of one to play and made bogey on 9, which is a somewhat gettable hole.

All in all, it was decent. It was really challenging, particularly those guys this morning, and we had it for our front nine. It's challenging golf.

I thought par would have been really good in this wind, and then maybe 1-under would have been a good score in half the wind.

Q. You birdied 18; that had to be a good highlight.

MATT KUCHAR: That was. That was a highlight. Nice drive but ball on the downslope from 195 up that hill is not a shot I'm great at or accustomed to, and was able to hit a 6-iron that didn't get much higher than 10 feet off the ground the entire way.

Landed on the front, back of the green to 18 feet and made the putt; certainly was a highlight. Highlight to birdie 18.

Q. Seems like your game is trending nicely, kind of quietly good scores and solid rounds. How do you feel? Where is the confidence?

MATT KUCHAR: I'm starting to gain some control of the golf ball again, starting to be able to kind of predict a little bit what's going to happen.

I struggled there for a little while. I didn't really know if the ball was going to go left or right, and now I kind of have a good feel for which way the ball is going to go. I feel like if I can somewhat predict the outcome I can point it in the right direction and kind of do okay.

I've kind of been able to spend a little more time with Chris O'Connell as we continue to ease through this COVID thing. I've gotten to spend some more time with him, and I always feel like the more time I get with him, the better I tend to do.

Q. Anyone under par is going to have a shot on the weekend here it looks like. What are your thoughts heading into the weekend?

MATT KUCHAR: It's a great setup. The PGA always does a very fair, very good test of golf. They've got that here at Southern Hills for sure. I feel like good shots get rewarded; bad shots get penalized. Kind of what you hope for a championship golf course. The leaderboard is stacked with good players.

If you look at the guys that have won here in the past from Dave Stockton to Ray Floyd to Nick Price to Tiger Woods, it's proper champions. I think it's going to take a proper golfer to get around this place and to come out on top.