KPMG WOMEN'S PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

June 21, 2022

Stacy Lewis

Congressional Country Club (Blue Course)

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Here with Stacy Lewis. I don't know what hat you're wearing this week. KPMG, Solheim Cup, LPGA TOUR, mom, all of the above. Welcome to KPMG Women's PGA Championship week.

How are you feeling as you set foot on Congressional and get ready for another major?

STACY LEWIS: A little worn out. More worn out than I would like to be. Definitely wearing a lot of hats. Got a lot going on in my head and on my phone, but, man, Congressional, just walking on property, this place is awesome.

The golf course is amazing. The hole setup this week for us as players is amazing. I'm excited. Looking forward to getting all this stuff done ahead of time and playing some golf on Thursday.

THE MODERATOR: Have you seen all of the golf course yet?

STACY LEWIS: Yes.

THE MODERATOR: What are your thoughts on this major test?

STACY LEWIS: It's awesome. I love the look of it, first. I guess just looking out and seeing the whole golf course. The setup is really good.

You've got a really good mix of holes. Short par-4s, short par-3s, long par-3s, long par-4s. You have par-5s that they could move some tees around and make reachable and make some really good holes out of them. I think we're going to see a lot of variety.

Truly, I don't think it fits one specific type of player. I think you've got to have everything. Every club in the bag is going to be tested, and you have to be great around the greens, great short game. Best player is truly going to win this week.

THE MODERATOR: That best player will be well-rewarded. The whole field well-rewarded thanks to the news of the $9 million purse, $1.35 million for the winner. I was in the dining room and kind of heard some people talking. What was it like for you? You clearly were aware of what was going on, but just to see this opportunity, take away the fact that you're a KPMG Ambassador. This is an mazing opportunity for any company to support the LPGA.

STACY LEWIS: It is. A couple of girls already said to me how amazing it is, and I did know it was coming. I didn't know it was going to be quite this big. I knew it was going to be big, but not quite this big.

It's amazing. I don't know how many times you can say it. KPMG from the start, you know, they raise the bar when they came on board for this championship. It pushed the USGA. It pushed the RNA to step up, and they're doing it again. I don't think they're done is my guess.

They've always had ideas that have been far ahead of everybody else, so I think there's more coming. I think they're in this follow long haul. We've got some great courses announced for the next four or five, I guess now.

This championship is in a great spot, and they've elevated women's golf, and they're going to continue to do it.

THE MODERATOR: One last question from me before we open. Four questions: Putting on the other hat, the Solheim Cup captain hat. I think this would be a good opportunity for you to see well-rounded challenges for your potential players' games perhaps?

STACY LEWIS: For sure. The one thing I've noticed so far is we play on a lot of different styles of golf courses, so it's figuring out who plays well on certain styles of golf courses and how that's going to fit to this ^ golf course.

I think it's important for me to see how different players play on tests like this versus a Meijer last week or even the U.S. Open venue at Pine Needles is completely different than this.

It will be good for me, and we had our first little get-together last night. I got about 20 players together for dinner last night, and just got everybody together and talked about a few things. Everybody is excited with what we're working on.

THE MODERATOR: Where did you guys go?

STACY LEWIS: Lia's in Bethesda.

THE MODERATOR: Recommendations?

STACY LEWIS: Yes, it was very good.

Q. Do you consider yourself a pretty organized person, and what's the biggest challenge of juggling all --

STACY LEWIS: I'm a very organized person. I've been that way for a long time. I'm a list maker. I have a calendar that I write everything down in.

The biggest challenge is just being where you are. I'll catch myself at times when I'm practicing checking my phone or something like that and just trying to put one hat on at a time and do that.

It's kind of me by nature. I'm an organized person, so it kind of fits in, I guess.

Q. With the golf hat on, it looked like you saw some nice things in, I guess, the bookend rounds last week. What have you been waiting to see in your own game, and what maybe did you see last week that you can build on?

STACY LEWIS: I've been working on the golf swing for the last couple of weeks, and actually got -- worked with Mizuno and got some new shafts for my irons that I think will help a lot that I've been testing out the last couple of days that have felt really good.

Just allow me to hit a few more shots and kind of figure it out. I was kind of playing for a miss instead of just going out there and hitting golf shots. So if I can get that ironed out, I feel like I'm trending in the right direction.

Q. Stacy, you were out here in darker days when we didn't have big purses and didn't play that great of golf courses. Played one event with no purse.

STACY LEWIS: Right.

Q. How do you put into perspective where we are now?

STACY LEWIS: I mean, I think back to 2011. I think we had 23 events. Almost half of those were outside of the United States.

This current group of players, I don't think they quite realize how lucky we are with the opportunities that we have. I mean, they have come to expect them over the last four or five years that this setup this week is normal. In our history of the LPGA, this is far from normal.

It's getting those players to understand how lucky we are and how we have to keep working. We have to keep building on this and making sure we're thanking the right people and doing the right things to continue to raise the bar.

Q. How do you communicate that to those younger players?

STACY LEWIS: Saying it. Staying it. Making sure they hear it over and over and over again.

You just have to keep putting it out there and getting your veteran players to say that and to realize it. I think it means a lot more coming from your peers than even a Commissioner or somebody on TOUR coming and telling you. I think your peers telling you how things used to be and how lucky we are, it means a lot more.

Q. Stacy, you mentioned the U.S. Women's Open. If you look at the top of that leaderboard, a lot of different countries represented, just like the World Golf Rankings. From an American perspective, where would you say the state of the game is, and do you foresee a time where the American women can dominate this sport the way they do basketball or soccer or other international sports?

STACY LEWIS: The way our TOUR is, I don't see any country dominating. You see that in our leaderboard and world rankings. The Americans themselves, we are trending in a great direction.

You've got some young players. Mina playing really well at the U.S. Open. Lilia Vu has been playing some awesome golf to start this year. Andrea Lee had no status, and she's been working her way slowly up the rankings.

I think we're in a great spot. Kind of bookend that with your Nelly and your Lexi and getting Danielle healthy, I think American golf is in a good spot. It's just different faces than everybody is used to, and that's just the natural progression of it.

There's always going to be changes. There's always going to be changing kind of rolling over of players. This new guard coming up is really good. Got some new names for people to learn.

Q. I want to ask you about Lexi to follow up, her being an Ambassador for the game and how much she brings eyeballs to tournaments and to TV.

STACY LEWIS: Lexi, she doesn't need a last name, right? She's the one person out here that probably doesn't need a last name. Everybody knows who she is.

Just the way she plays and her ability to hit the golf ball in itself is so impressive. You watch her walk around and the way she treats the fans and the little kids, you you know, it's something that I think a lot of young players could learn a lot from.

Q. Was this your first time playing Congressional, or how many times have you played it?

STACY LEWIS: This is my first time on site. I played nine holes yesterday and 18 today, and I'll get nine more in tomorrow.

Q. You mentioned loving the variety of the scores. What about as it relates to approach shots? Particularly, some of the blind approach shots out here. I think there's about seven or eight.

STACY LEWIS: Yeah, there's a couple of long par-4s. I think it's 15. Very difficult hole. I think that hole is going to play pretty tough as the week goes on.

It's just the slopes and the fairways, you know, keeping the ball in the fairways, keeping the ball on the greens, the slopes on the greens. There's a lot of different challenges. It's not just one thing.

You're going to have uneven lies in the fairways to your tee shots shaping them the right way to keep them in the fairways. Once you get to the greens, you have all these slopes that you have to be on the right side of. There's a lot of challenges that you've got pick up on as much as you can in two rounds, basically.

Q. Is there one shot that seems like it's the hardest shot out there?

STACY LEWIS: I don't know yet. Anything coming up 18 with the chance to win is a hard shot. (Laughing).

Q. So there's been a lot of talk about money lately in golf in general. Especially on the men's side. Given that there are so many question marks about what's coming, how crucial do you think the timing of today's announcement is in terms of the money on the women's side?

STACY LEWIS: I mean, obviously, it coincides with the championship. Just all our majors and the way they've stepped up. It's been pretty amazing to see what the USGA has done now here. The RNA kind of started it last year. They stepped up big. I think Evian has even put more money in their purse. Chevron is kind of coming in the back end and kind of coming in a little bit late to the party, and they're going to get up to this level too at some point.

It's huge for us. I think as players, these girls are really great, and getting on network TV, getting to play these golf courses -- not to say that you deserve it, but if we did get on par with the guys or closer, keep narrowing that gap, then we're doing the right things. Just giving them the opportunity to be great athletes and get paid for it.

THE MODERATOR: We just had Mariah Stackhouse in as well announcing she was joining you as an LPGA USGA Girls Golf Ambassador. I know you've get Chesnee running around. We see all the kids running around. How cool is it to have Mariah on the team and what you guys are doing at Girls Golf and touching so many lives as you grow the game?

STACY LEWIS: Our numbers have grown exponentially over the last five to ten years since we really -- give Mike Whan some credit here for the investment that he really made in that and the number of girls that are playing.

Last weekend at Meijer the number of little kids I saw out there was amazing. Especially it was pretty cool on Sunday to see all the little girls and their dads running around.

Just having a kid of my own, you want these little girls to have the opportunities and that's what Girls Golf does and anything I can do to help that.

THE MODERATOR: There's one last question I want to ask before we close, and it's again looking back to a year ago, it was right about now that we rolled out the stats program, the KPMG Performance Insights.

We've got them on our media boards. We're rolling them into places. As you pull out the Solheim Cup, how have those helped you and your fellow players really be able to hone in on some of the better and points of your game that maybe need to be improved?

STACY LEWIS: It's been tremendous. You always have an idea of how you're playing, but just to really put numbers to it. I think it's been great for the telecasts, for our fans to really see these players have been trending and playing really well, so it's really no surprise when they do win. Right?

The results are coinciding with it. Typical KPMG fashion, they want to know how we can do it better and continue to get more stats and more information out there. Not just for us, but for how to make this TOUR better and how as players we can be better.

THE MODERATOR: We'll wrap it up. Thanks so much. See you tomorrow.

STACY LEWIS: Thank you.