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THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT

June 4, 2005

Scott Verplank

DUBLIN, OHIO

Q. Nice round.

SCOTT VERPLANK: Thanks.

Q. Conditions today, I mean, guys are starting to make moves and then some are backing off and some are keeping it going.

SCOTT VERPLANK: Well, the wind is not blowing very much and the golf course is in perfect shape. You know, if you get it in the groove, today is your day.

Q. (Inaudible).

SCOTT VERPLANK: Well, it's just because the weather is so good. There's no wind blowing and the golf course is in great shape. If you hit the rhythm, today is the day you can shoot the low score.

Q. The greens a lot faster today?

SCOTT VERPLANK: I thought they were, yes. After I knocked it by four or five feet the first couple holes, I went, "yeah, I think they're a little faster." But they're good.

Q. You guys always talk about the conditions being great here, but aren't they great everywhere you play?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Not like here.

Q. If so, what separates this place condition wise from other places you play?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Well, it's always good here. The fairways are always good; others have bent and poa fairways. It is better here. The kind of conditions that you have here, usually you have moisture here, which softens it up, but just the kind of grass they have on the fairways and on the greens, obviously Jack has done a lot of work to have poa annua out of them. Conditions are better here. Most places are very good, but this place is exceptional.

Q. Did you have chances to keep going even lower coming in?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Oh, I had a few decent chances. I would have had to have made a couple of 15 or 20 footer. I didn't play quite as well. I made five birdies in a row. You can't expect to keep going. I mean, I was hoping to and I was sure as heck trying to. I hid one bad shot and made bogey and then birdied the next hole coming back and didn't have a lot of great chances after that.

Q. We've seen a couple of guys go through some stretches where they've been able to put it together. They've roughly been around the same area. Furyk had six in a row.

SCOTT VERPLANK: He was setting the precedent.

Q. What's going on through that stretch there?

SCOTT VERPLANK: I don't know, you've got a couple par 5s and a pretty accessible pin on the 6th hole today, and 8 and 9 the pin on 8 is a tough pin. I hit a nice shot there. I don't know, I think just when the weather is like this and you get it in the groove, you can hit some nice shots. You know, the wind is not messing with you and the golf course is, like I said, so perfect that if you get it going the right way, you can get it going here.

Q. Fairways are running and the greens are holding?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Yeah, the greens are kind of medium firm. They're holding okay. They're not totally soft. They're really nice. Fairways are running, so you have to hit it a little bit straighter, which is good.

Q. You put Thursdays round behind you and put together two good rounds. Is there something mentally you can do to kind of say, hey, how can I get back in this?

SCOTT VERPLANK: No, not really. I just played so bad Thursday and had a groovy ball mark deal and I just didn't play good. I was hoping to come out and play better Friday morning, and I did. I wasn't expecting it, I just wanted to play better.

Q. I was just wondering if at the end of Thursday you thought you'd be in contention.

SCOTT VERPLANK: No. I've got to play pretty well tomorrow to really be in contention.

Q. This has typically been a bombers' course. How do you explain you, Toms and Sluman?

SCOTT VERPLANK: I think since it hasn't been raining and the fairways are firm, I think it's a little bit more position. I think this is the way Jack would like to have it play because you have to work your ball to keep it in the fairway, whereas nine out of ten years you just hit it as far as you can up in the air and it just plugs out in the fairway. There's a little more premium on accuracy.

Q. When you get to Monday, if you don't win, will you look at the penalty stroke and wonder how much it cost you? I know you have to call it on yourself, but

SCOTT VERPLANK: I guess when I lose by a shot or if I lose in a playoff or something, but that's part of the game. I also hit one in the water that day and got a penalty shot. That's the rules we play by.

Q. Can you think of a tournament where you finished high up after a bad first round?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Yeah, U.S. Open a couple years I shot like 6 over the first round and played very well the rest of the way and finished in the Top 10. Actually I think I bogeyed the last two holes to go from 3rd to 8th, got it back under par for the tournament.

Q. Did you catch any grief out there with your head covers?

SCOTT VERPLANK: No, nobody notices that stuff.

Q. I mean, I would think there would be a couple of astute fans out there who would look a little bit deeper into it and see. Nobody is giving you any crap?

SCOTT VERPLANK: Here?

Q. Yeah, just because it's here.

SCOTT VERPLANK: I think they all understand that that is the OSU, and here they the OSU here is not really the OSU. They don't want to bring up that kind of stuff.

Q. You don't need to remind them of the Alamo Bowl score?

SCOTT VERPLANK: That's football; we're talking golf.

Q. (Inaudible).

SCOTT VERPLANK: No, I just wore this lightweight shirt and it just soaked up the fluid.

End of FastScripts.

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