Publications
Partners
San Francisco - A chat with his father and a couple of overtime matches that delayed the start of Jordan Spieth's second day at TPC Harding Park might have paid off Thursday in the Match Play Championship.
The greens are firm when they receive shots and they feel that way under foot. Masters champion Jordan Spieth, however, said they are rolling slower that it would seem.
The phone call with his father helped.
"He's not here. He can't see any of the putts other than watching coverage," Spieth said.
"But he made a point that I have struggled in the past when I go from faster greens to slower greens the next week or within two weeks, making the adjustment and trusting it. And he said it just seemed like this week it was ... with the putts that I did make yesterday, he said it seems like if I had noticed anything. I had noticed that, which was interesting."
Spieth went from his wire-to-wire victory at Augusta National to Hilton Head, and then a week off before arriving at Harding Park. He made seven birdies in his opening match Wednesday, though most of them were from the 8-foot range.
On the second day, Spieth had to wait to tee off because of three matches that went extra holes.
"I spent the entire time on the putting green," Spieth said.
"Maybe I got a little more work done in adjusting. And that showed."
Did it ever.
He missed a birdie putt to lose the first hole. He missed a par putt to lose the third hole. But from the sixth hole on, the Masters champion couldn't miss. Spieth one-putted his last 10 holes for a 4-and-3 victory over Matt Every.
