FEDEX ST. JUDE CHAMPIONSHIP

August 13, 2023

Lucas Glover

TPC Southwind

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: We'd like to welcome Lucas Glover, our 2023 FedExCup St. Jude Championship winner to the interview room here in Memphis. Lucas, tell us about that round.

LUCAS GLOVER: Where would you like me to start? It was very similar to yesterday. I was fighting my golf swing a little bit, but short game bailed me out, especially my putting.

Got to a point there middle of the back nine where it was just kind of survive and try to give myself as many chances as I could coming in. Did a good job of that, but only made one. A nice up-and-down on 17, obviously, to stay in the tie with Patrick, which I knew what was going on ahead.

A couple big putts on 13, 14, one for par, one for bogey, that kept us in the game for sure.

Q. If you think back to where you were two, three months ago, is this at all hard to believe? I know you've been through the process.

LUCAS GLOVER: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, if you would have told me this three months ago, I'd tell you you're crazy. But at the same time, if you asked me legitimately did I think I was capable, I'd say yes, even then.

It's just one of those sad ways athletes are wired. We always believe in ourselves no matter how bad it is.

I never gave that up, but like middle of May, it was hard to go to the range some days and hard to work. But we pushed through and did it anyway.

Q. How would you describe the pressure you felt coming down the back nine and the playoff compared with last week trying to win?

LUCAS GLOVER: I'd say they were pretty equal. I was firing on all cylinders last week, just kind of hitting it where I was looking, with the exception of the par-5 after the restart. But today it was a fight. It was a physical fight. I was fighting my swing and wasn't hitting it great.

My short game was there, and that's the only reason I'm sitting here now is my chipping and putting yesterday and today.

But pressure-wise, I'd say on par with last week but just different. Last week was more trying to win. This week was more trying to survive and just stay in the game and see if something good happened.

I wasn't able to force anything because I wasn't hitting it my best.

Q. Could you talk to me about I think it was on 17 tee, you stuck your hands in the cooler, and I was wondering if there was something that was really bugging you or just trying to cool down.

LUCAS GLOVER: It's a way to keep my hands from sweating. If you leave them in there as long as you can stand it and then wipe them off real quick, it closes your pores up for 10, 15 minutes. So I do that if there's any water in the coolers when it's like this, since I don't wear a glove. It literally stops them from sweating for a little while.

So if I've got time, I'll do it as much as possible. No injuries or anything, just a way to kind of keep the sweat to a minimum.

Q. Take us back to June, and you're trying to qualify for the U.S. Open. That was a playoff. You missed a short putt to not get in. I think it turned out to be a positive in the end. Could you take us from that to where you are now? It seems like you built off of that, didn't lose faith in what you were trying to do.

LUCAS GLOVER: Well, walking back to the car after missing that putt, my dad was there, and Tommy was with me, obviously, and Tom just looked at me and goes, I don't really care that you missed that putt. This is a process with this new putter, and there's going to be some bumps, but he said, I can't tell you how much better you look and how much more confident you look.

I needed to hear that at that moment, even though I was kind of dejected. Went on to Canada and had my best week in a few months. I believe it was that same week.

Still, I missed one yesterday on 16, but it's not that nervy, yippy stroke; it's just a bad stroke. It's just like missing the green with a 7-iron. It's just physical. It happens.

So just knowing that, it's freer.

Q. What were the emotions on 14? You had a situation, you look at leaderboards, so what were you thinking?

LUCAS GLOVER: I was thinking, hit it at that very bright orange FedEx sign in the back of the grandstand that's dead in the middle of the green, and I hit it about 25 yards right of that with a 6-iron, which I don't do very often.

Once I realized that I had done that, I just said, let's try to make a 4 any way possible, and I didn't hit a very good wedge shot and then made a -- I think it was close to 30 feet, estimated, but after that went in, I said, all right, you're not going to be the only guy to bogey that hole, big deal, let's go, and I made an eight-footer on 15, so I recovered nicely. It was just mentally get over it and just go.

Q. I know this has happened kind of fast, but in the last five starts, has the Ryder Cup gotten on your mind at all?

LUCAS GLOVER: About 15 minutes ago.

Q. What did you think?

LUCAS GLOVER: I think I've never made it and I want to.

Q. Can you run me through 18 in regulation? You've just hooked your tee shot on 17 into the left rough and now you're facing water down the left side, yet you hit that perfect. Is there a way you reset yourself to be able to do that? How do you not think about that?

LUCAS GLOVER: Just for clarification, driver on 17, 3-wood 18, so that's for whatever.

But yeah, I don't miss left often, so when I do, I try not to really overthink it. I've always been a drawer, so my miss is usually right, as we saw on 14. Thanks, Rex.

But on the corner of that bunker where I hit it, it's only 242 cover downwind with a 3-wood. That's no problem.

I just told myself, you've got the club that puts it in the widest part of the fairway and can't go through on the right, covers on the left on that corner, so it was just focus on good rhythm off the ball. That's my key anytime there's nerves or anytime it's high pressure, I get fast in the backswing, so it's just a little slower off of it and let it ride.

Q. Which was the better putt in your opinion, 13, 14 or maybe 17?

LUCAS GLOVER: I mean, 14 just from a -- it was 30 feet left to right with about a foot of break, so on paper that would be the hardest one. Is there a good bogey? Well, that was one in this situation, and I had the ability -- that gave me the ability to actually take some momentum off of that green, making a putt like that, even for bogey.

Then I hit two really nice shots on 15, just right there, and misread the putt and whatever. But found my range. Sounds like it's 30 feet for par or bogey, today anyway.

Q. What do you think it shows about you that not only did you keep going, but at 43 you're playing some of the best golf of your life?

LUCAS GLOVER: Maybe I'm really stubborn.

You know, 10 years up until this run, I've underachieved and knew it. It was all because of putting. I won the Deere because I hit it in the grip a bunch for a week basically and snuck them in somehow.

Yeah, it was just believing in myself, and hard-headed and stubborn enough to not give up. Never really thought about it, honestly. It was just, I'll figure it out, and it took something drastic to figure it out, but it's worked, obviously.

Q. I didn't see the outcome on 13. Can you take us through that? Not the putt but what preceded it.

LUCAS GLOVER: Sure, hit a decent drive up the left. Got going towards that bunker and stopped in the first cut, 10 inches from the bunker, so my feet were in, got the heel way up in the air, and with the pin front left, obviously a big hook lie, it was just make sure it's right so we're not short-sided because I probably wasn't going to get it there. So I did; it hit it in the right rough into one of those kind of low areas that were quite muddy, and I thought it might have buried.

I called an official over, and it had come out of my pitch mark just behind it. It almost looked like it was in somebody else's perhaps. Couldn't really definitively say, but it wouldn't have mattered because it was obvious which one was mine.

That being said, it was muddy, soupy in there and not a very good lie and just had to hack it out, just kind of played it like a bunker shot, 20 feet by the hole, and from where I was, it was really a heck of a shot.

So kind of two bad breaks and then a good break making the par putt. We read it perfect, and I got the speed right, and it just went in the right corner.

Q. When you talk about survival, and it sounds like you were fighting it all day, but when you take a moment like 13, a 6-iron like 14, is that when the biggest part of the survival instinct was at its strongest?

LUCAS GLOVER: Well, you know, having that long walk to 15 tee was probably a blessing. Gave me some time to kind of refocus a little bit.

I knew I wasn't out of it. It looked like Patrick was almost done, so I knew I wasn't out of it. But it was going to take a birdie or two coming in, and you've got a wedge into 15; 16, reachable with a front pin; hit good drives on 17 and 18, with those pins you can make birdie.

It wasn't like I was just conceding that all right, it's going to be a good week. It was, let's get four good looks and try to run the table here because we've got a bunch of short clubs in.

But it wasn't that easy. Never is. But that was the mindset.

Q. I think you'd have to win next week to earn your spot on to the team. If you don't, would you pick you?

LUCAS GLOVER: Right now, yes. Playing pretty good golf, and I think I'd be pretty good in the team room and be a good partner, so yeah, absolutely I would.

Q. As you talked through 13 and 14, can you talk through 17, how difficult that was, and did you know where you were in the larger scheme of things when you made that?

LUCAS GLOVER: Yes, sir. I was trying to draw it into the left side of the fairway for the right pin, the right front pin, and I just overdid it. Had an average lie, and I was just -- I had a lie that I thought I could get up close to the front of the green, low hook, and with playing lift, clean and place out of the zoysia fairways, if you get it up there in the front, give yourself a good lie, you can spin it. For a front pin, that's all you can ask for. So that was the mindset.

It didn't come out great, but I knew it had to get over the creek. I think we had 56 yards to the hole with a perfect lie, and I hit an okay shot, 12 feet, and I knew that one was important. But it was straight up the hill, into the grain, and we actually played it straight, and it was the right read, and I hit it hard enough.

Q. You talked about it being difficult going to the range back in May. Was there ever a time that you considered quitting, and what do you love about this career that kept you going?

LUCAS GLOVER: I love competing. Sorry, to answer your first question, no, I never gave any thought to hanging them up completely, no. Taking some time away, sure. But never just hanging it up.

I just like to compete. I like to compete, and I like being around the guys. It's more fun when you play well, obviously, but I just like the journey. Every week is a different week. Every event is a different event. You've got different course, different grass, different wind. It's fun.

Except for when I have to do my laundry, then it's not that fun.

I enjoy it. I enjoy being out here. I wouldn't trade it for anything, honestly.