LIV GOLF TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP MICHIGAN

August 23, 2025

Jon Rahm

Bryson DeChambeau

Louis Oosthuizen

The Cardinal at Saint John’s

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Let's welcome the winning captains from today's semifinals, advancing to Sunday's Championship Final at the LIV Golf Team Championship Michigan.

Bryson, I'll start with you. Crushers versus Smash was the tightest contest of the day today with each match going 18 holes. Your singles win over Talor Gooch proved to be decisive, and your foursomes pairs of Howell and Casey continued their winning form today. How do you assess your own game and your team's winning form as you move into stroke play for the final?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: It was a great day for Charles and Baan. He's a great wedger and a solid putter. For me, sometimes it's nice. I can drive some of the greens if it's good winds.

I played well today. Talor, hat's off to him. He shot 6-under, and it's not easy to beat someone when they shoot 6-under. He started off strong, 2-under for the first three. I had to kick it into gear.

My team played really well today, but it's a different format for tomorrow, four scores counting. I think these teams up here are incredible teams, incredible golfers, and it's going to be a tough test tomorrow because it's scoring conditions out there for sure. It's about who makes the most putts and who wedges it close.

THE MODERATOR: Louis, congratulations on today's win over Torque. Stinger came into this week on strong form as the team here entering the finals with the most recent win. With the title to be decided in stroke play tomorrow, do you feel like that gives your team a bit more momentum heading into tomorrow's championship final?

LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN: Yeah, we played well coming into this week. Match play and stroke play are so different, but we got a good combination with me and Charl playing alternate shot. Then Dean obviously playing very well. Branden again fell short with Mito playing unbelievable today.

We feel good. We feel strong going into tomorrow. I think it will be -- like Bryson said, there's a lot of scoring opportunities, but you still need to make good putts. It should be a good matchup tomorrow.

THE MODERATOR: Jon, congratulations on Legion XIII's win over HyFlyers GC today. Your 3&1 singles victory over Phil Mickelson was the highlight match today, and young guns Caleb Surratt and Tom McKibbin stepped up again today. Can you take us through the team's performance today and what a result like that does for your confidence heading into Sunday?

JON RAHM: Very hard for me to talk on their performance because I wasn't able to watch much. Tom and Caleb seemed to have gotten comfortable playing together. It seemed like both days they got to that 1-up lead fairly quickly and maintained it and just kept playing steady, not making mistakes, and getting it done at the end.

The only shot I've seen today is Tom's drive on 1, which when you're 2-up, two to play and you drive it to 12 feet, that's a pretty good exclamation point. Hat's off to them. They played incredible.

Tyrrell had a tough match coming in with a guy that's now 7-0 in match play in LIV is quite impressive. I saw at one point he was 3-down. Next time I look up it's all square, and Camo got it done.

When it comes to me and Phil, neither one of us particularly had our best. We both made some mistakes, but at the end, I think, from 11 on -- 11's the only bad shot I had on the back nine. From 11 on I played fairly consistent and gave myself a good chance pretty much on every hole. It was just nice to make that putt on 17 and just not give him a chance to possibly extend the match to 18. That felt really good.

When it comes to tomorrow, looking forward to it. Any team here is strong. Any team has a chance. Hopefully we can keep doing what we've done all year and have a good showing tomorrow and get it done.

But like Bryson said, it's very scorable out there. I think for the viewers and everybody here watching, it's going to be fun because you're definitely going to see a lot of score changes quickly just because of how many birdies can be done on quick holes.

Q. Jon, obviously this year you guys had the best stroke average as a team. I would assume that gives you a lot of confidence. You were 24 strokes better than anybody else. Bryson's team was second. Does that mean something going into tomorrow, or is it because we've had the match play and it's kind of a different format? How do you assess what you guys did during the regular season going into tomorrow?

JON RAHM: I would say how I assess pretty much every single round, whatever we've done until right now doesn't matter anymore. Tomorrow you have 18 holes to prove it again, and that's all we have. It's the same thing for all of us. It's been a great season, and now it's time to hopefully finish it.

Q. I did want to ask you about the young guys. How have they been this week? Have they been super excited to kind of have a match play chance together as partners?

JON RAHM: It's hard to get any emotion out of Tom, to be honest. Anything you ask, like yeah, all right, I'm okay, no matter what you ask. That's what I think makes him such a good foursome player.

Same with Caleb. You can see they both wanted to -- they both wanted to be here, and they both wanted to do well. It's just they're both for the most part quite collected individuals. Me and Tyrrell take the other side of the coin.

It's nice to see two young guys so even keel throughout the whole thing, but obviously, yeah, they do want to be here. When I first spoke to Tom before coming to LIV, this is a tournament that obviously one of the weeks that came to mind and something we're really excited. That can get you ready for many future things.

We're all extremely excited, just very different ways of showing it.

Q. Bryson, you guys have a chance to be the first team to win two team championships. What would it mean if you got the job done tomorrow?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: It would mean a lot for our team. We grinded. Last year we played well, lost to the Iron Heads, so we wanted a bit of revenge just like in 2022, the first season when Stingers got us in Miami. That was frustrating.

Came back and won in '23, and then '24 was a letdown. So hopefully we end on a high note this year and tomorrow.

Q. Obviously there was a lot of discussion after your decision yesterday. Is it basically just based on form? Like obviously Talor was Smash's best player this year based on points standings. Was that how you kind of decided on it?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: There was numerous factors going into it, but Gooch is playing well. He shot 6-under today. I knew I had to go out and shoot 7-, 8-under. Brooks hasn't been playing his best, and I felt like Baan would be a perfect match for Brooks. I knew Paul and Charles would be perfect together again. That's kind of how I set it up.

Q. Louis, last year no team shot better on Sunday at the team championship than you guys. Obviously you weren't in the championship tier. You get a chance tomorrow. If you do that, you obviously win the title. What does that mean?

LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN: I think we all play to be in this situation, to have a shot at it tomorrow. We've had a rough season really and not playing really well but made a big turn in Chicago. Then going into this week, we felt really comfortable. It will be for us going into tomorrow, it's going to be go big or go home. We're going to try our best to upset everyone and see if we can get it done.

Q. I just want to reflect a little bit on that pairing with you and Charl. Your first win together was the 2013 Presidents Cup. You beat Phil and Keegan Bradley. You played against Tiger Woods with that pairing. It goes all the way back 12 years ago. Now you're 4-0 together on LIV in match play. Can you reflect on that pairing and you guys, what makes you so good together?

LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN: We're just very comfortable around each other. I don't think we've ever said sorry to each other if we hit a bad shot. Yeah, we know each other's game, and we really feel just very comfortable around each other.

Then to be able to play your game, don't have the pressure of thinking your partner is the whole time around you. We just do our thing, and I don't even walk to the tees with him. He does it -- you know, do his own thing. It's just a very good relationship. We're pretty good together.

Q. Just asking you about Dean. He's grown into one of the better players on the Tour. He comes up huge for you today, knocking off Niemann as well. How would you describe how he's grown as a player and as a person since he joined your team?

LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN: From the start, I said Dean's a great player. He's got the length. He's got the short game, and he's just got a good head on him when he goes out on the golf course and plays.

I knew it was going to be a tough matchup today with Joaquín. Joaquín started poorly, and then at the end there he went five birdies in six holes and came back from being 4-down against Dean, but he kept on going.

He's a great guy on and off the golf course, Dean. I know he's got lots of wins still in him.

Q. Match play is so volatile. You never know what's going to happen. Is there a sense of relief now to take a breath? Early finish today, you can rev it up again and get set for tomorrow?

JON RAHM: Yeah, I do think it's kind of nice to have finished a little earlier today, get a little bit of easy afternoon. Whoever wants to go to the concert can go to the concert, but definitely have a little extra time to mentally get ready and relax, especially with the later tee time tomorrow.

Match play, as much as it is fun, it's stressful, especially when it's one day for the team. Inevitably you look at the board and see what's going on and just trying to manage your thoughts in general, right? Again, it's so enjoyable that it goes by nice and quick. Tomorrow is going to be a different feeling in that sense knowing how much the scores will change. No individual scoreboard, just team scoreboard.

Looking forward to it. Looking forward to this afternoon. It's going to be a great day tomorrow.

Q. Bryson, just curious how the mindset changes going from match play to stroke play tomorrow? And what kind of scores do you think we'll see tomorrow?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: I hope it's low tomorrow for our team. Legion is going to throw up a deep number, and Stingers will do what they normally do, throw up a deep number. Dean is playing incredibly well.

We've got to focus on playing stroke play golf and going as low as possible. It's gettable. Barring a few holes, try and birdie every hole.

Q. Jon, for you, what did you make of the atmosphere on the 1st tee today? How did the vibe and the energy compare to other tournaments you've seen in the U.S. this year?

JON RAHM: What did you say about the 1st tee?

Q. What did you make of the atmosphere, the crowd vibe on the 1st tee today?

JON RAHM: It was great. I sort of felt like the underdog today because the entire crowd was wanting Phil to win, which was understandable. I'm not in familiar territory, but it was nice to almost in a weird way feel like the villain for the day in a very weird way. I had a lot of support out there.

The crowd was great. I know it's an earlier tee time, a lot of people might rather be home watching football, but it was quite a few people out there, and they were present. You could hear them everywhere, like I could hear when Bryson did something across the course. I could hear when all the good things were happening far away. It's just part of what makes golf really, really fun. Those echos across the course are incredible.

I'm hoping that tomorrow, being a little bit later, better weather, we're going to have just as good a crowd, if not better, and give them a good reason to cheer all day long for sure.

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: It was really cool. We were teeing off on 5, and Talor Gooch, and you could see a sea of people coming down 1 for Jon and Phil. That was really cool to see.

Q. Similar question for Bryson. You've played in this area obviously before. The atmosphere at this event compared to other events you've been in this area and as well as the venue, what you think of the golf course. Is it the quality you expected, the immaculate conditions, all that?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: Yeah, I think the people of Detroit are exciting. They definitely are not afraid to speak their mind. It's a lot of fun having the crowd out here. When I've been up here before, they were the same way.

It's a lot of fun being up in Detroit, first off, and then second off, the golf course conditions, it's in really great shape. Pretty easy golf course, but I sometimes like it that way, especially for match play. It's fun to get after it and try to drive greens and whatnot. I think it's a great match play golf course. Coming off of stroke play tomorrow, we've all got to play good golf and make a lot of birdies.

Q. How low can you go? Do you have a number in mind?

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: I don't think like that usually. I try to go birdie the next hole.

JON RAHM: Try to break 50. (Laughter).

BRYSON DeCHAMBEAU: Break 50, exactly.

Q. Jon, I wanted to ask you about how you define success in golf. Last week a bit of a strange scene. You'd just won the individual championship, $18 million, but you were in a somber mood. Do you think you had a successful season in 2025? Do you view it as a success?

JON RAHM: Yeah, I was in a somber mood because I hit the frickin' flagstick and lost the playoff. I'm not going to be happy about that. That's the most recent thing. At that moment I was not thinking about the overall season.

If you're going to base how successful a season is based on if you win or not or how many wins you have in golf, it can be quite difficult. I played incredible golf all year long, gave myself plenty of chances, just didn't get it done. As long as I'm trying my best in every single shot of the day, it's a successful season. That's all I can say.

It's never easy in golf. Very few golfers have been able to win every single year they've played. My year's still not over. I still have some events later on in the year that I can possibly win. Yes, I would consider this a success. Almost maintained 100 percent top 10 straight this year and averaged, I think it was 6th in all those events, played good in majors. Yeah, I've had a great year. Just haven't closed out.

It's still not over. I might get it done. Hopefully tomorrow we'll get it done as a team, and it might be an added exclamation point to the year. So far it's been a successful year. Hopefully I can finish it off playing as good as I have.

Q. Jon, following your match today, you had a bunch of thick juicy lies there off the fairway or around the green. I'm thinking about the one on 4 that kind of got you. Then 17, you hit the one close. Then 14 as well, you just had a little chip that kind of ran down the hill there. What's maybe a key that the average golfer could learn on some of those shots that you hit, especially the ones where you kind of recovered and got them up and in?

JON RAHM: They're all so different, it would be difficult to say. I grew up in similar rough. So I'm fairly confident around the greens here when I'm in the rough. Usually wet just kind of poa annua type of grass. It's just instinctive at this point when I'm playing this kind.

The one on 4, I couldn't even figure it out. It was a bit of a hit and hope and hoping it will get over the creek and go straight, and it did one of those things for the most part. If you don't have the swing speed that us up here have or many other pros have, it's going to be very difficult to tell you what to do.

A lot of times is you grab your club, open the face, swing as hard as you can and hope it goes straight. If you don't have the speed, you're not going to be able to do much. If it's that bad a lie, pitch it out to the fairway and try again from there. If not, keeping that face open a little bit in case the hosel comes in and closes the face is nice.

Plus you're not really making contact with the golf ball. Bryson can give you the physics of it. You're never really going to spin it. It's just going to come off straight. It's more of a path rather than face. I'll say just take your medicine and move on.

Q. It seemed like it took you a little bit to feel the greens out there. I think you rolled in a short downhiller on 8 and that kind of got you going. What did you see on the greens for yourself after you said yesterday that your daughter could putt better than you?

JON RAHM: I went on the putting green yesterday afterwards and tried to figure out what was going wrong. I think I had a good idea, got a good handle on it. Got tested on the 1st hole with a curling five footer and got a 180 horseshoe that just felt like a knife to the heart to start the day.

After that, even some of the putts that were conceded, I kept hitting them. It felt good. It felt good. The main one was five, the five feet, dead straight. Not a difficult putt, but slightly a tester. All right. Made a perfect stroke, dead center. Hit a good putt on 6, a good one on 7, it just didn't go in.

Seeing that one on 8 go in was nice, gave me a lot of confidence. Had to make it, gave it some speed, went in. Then made the one on 9. After that, it was a much better day.

The good feeling started way earlier. It's just it's not easy to make putts. I've actually found it fairly tricky to read these greens sometimes. A lot of putts have broken a lot more or a lot less than what I've seen.

Q. I know you're friends with Phil. Obviously watched your YouTube match with Josh Allen and Grant Horvat. It seemed a little less snarky out there today. How was it between you and Phil?

JON RAHM: It's never going to be like you see on YouTube. The only talking we did besides good shot and things like that was walking off 12th tee because I didn't give him the short putt on 11. I told him the only reason you putted that was because I was going to putt mine on 10. Even though he ended up conceding, I knew he was going to make me putt it. I told him now we're even. Move on and have a good day. That was the only thing we talked.

Yeah, that was it. He laughed. He enjoyed it. I know, had it been me, I would have putted both of them. It is what it is. After our banter many times, I am happy that whenever he brings up me losing to him and Grant, I can just hold it over his head. That's the most recent win.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much, captains. Good luck tomorrow.