THE AMERICAN EXPRESS

January 24, 2026

Scottie Scheffler

PGA WEST Pete Dye Stadium Course

Quick Quotes

Q. You were saying it was windy and tricky out there. How would you sum up the way you played? How would you sum up the round?

SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER: Yeah, I think I did pretty good. I got to have to a bit of a slow start. But I made a nice birdie there on 7. I hit two really good shots into 8. I struck the ball pretty nicely for the rest of the round. So I was pretty pleased with how I was playing. Outside of a couple bogeys, clean that up heading into tomorrow.

Q. There were several, I don't know, it looked like 80- to 100-yard shots not getting within 20 or 25 feet. Is that wind, is that you, is that firm greens?

SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER: There's definitely challenging aspects to playing in the wind out here. You kind of get tucked into between the houses back there and the wind can kind of bounce around. Just got to be a little sharper tomorrow and, yeah.

Q. Anything else? I wanted to ask you how you played the 16th.

SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER: I hit a driver.

Q. I mean, it looked like a really good drive and a really good iron.

SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER: I hit a high drive that was able to get some wind behind it. And I hit a really, I mean, probably the best shot of the day, that 5-iron there pin high. Really challenging second shot to give myself a really good look for eagle. It was a really nice shot.

Q. Not to sound overly stupid, but what's challenging about it? What are you looking at on your second shot into 16? Are you looking left?

SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER: Well, I mean, if you just barely go over the green, you're in a really tough spot to get up and down. If you miss it barely left, like my ball landed on line with the pin, and you're still in danger of missing the green left. Then the green is really firm, and you got wind down off the right, and the front right part of the green actually slopes away. So you only got a few yards there where you can land a 5-iron from 220 yards. Is that enough reasons? (Laughing).