U.S. SENIOR AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP

September 2, 2026

Mike Sposa

Baltimore Country Club (East Course)

Quick Quotes

Q. Mike, congratulations. Two hard-earned matches today. Do you want to just quickly recap the morning match and kind of what your feelings were there?

MIKE SPOSA: Yeah. Tony played really well this morning. He hits it a long way. I was playing well, too. It was kind of back and forth all day. I was always up for the majority of it, and then, you know, he just made a mistake on 16 and I was able to capitalize on a really good two putt. And then I hit it in there six inches on 17 again and was able to just tie 18 for the win.

I did not play as well this afternoon and I know Corby didn't play as well either. I've known him also for most of my life. It was just a match of just grinding it out and all heart, you know. I just didn't feel good this afternoon.

I don't know if it was a little bit of the weather that softened the course up considerably and really, really slowed the greens down. It was just very difficult to judge. It was difficult to judge approach shots that you're used to releasing and taking slopes; they're now just stopping.

Same thing kind of on chip shots. If you're outside 20 feet it was just almost impossible to get it to the hole. Corby was experiencing the same thing. I mean, we left putts short all day.

So I'm just happy to get through it. Yeah, fought it out.

Q. Kind of talk to me about the weather delay. What did you do? I know you had an earlier match so you had a bit of time in between.

MIKE SPOSA: Yeah.

Q. What did you do? Did you keep your mind off things or...

MIKE SPOSA: I had a great conversation with a member here, Beau Dixon. Never met him before but we have a lot of friends in common, and obviously golf in common.

So I sat on that porch out back with him for almost the entire rain delay watching tennis and telling golf stories.

Yeah, it was actually a really nice, relaxing afternoon. Wish I would've played better this afternoon and made it a little less stressful, but it is what it is.

But he was a great man and that's what I did.

Q. I know you made two huge putts on the difficult par-3s here, one of them being No. 9, which has played so tough all week. That was a big one. Also on 17. Talk about those two putts.

MIKE SPOSA: Nine is just a brutal hole. Everybody is just trying to make a three there. The green is very severe and it's a long shot uphill.

17, it's been very good to me this week. I had a hole-in-one there. I've now birdied it I think three times.

So I don't know, it's funny, too, because in the practice round I came up short, and I was really I think got my focus on what it was actually playing. I think that was a benefit for me coming up short in a practice round, because, yeah, I improved on that greatly.

Q. You had a great debut last year but now you're one step closer than last year. You're about to face someone that you know very well. Do you want to just talk about tomorrow and what your thoughts are there?

MIKE SPOSA: Yeah, Todd and I go way back for amateur days when I got out of school and he was kind of doing the whole deal.

And then we went -- I think he tried to play professionally for a little bit and I played professionally for almost 17 years. You know, it had been so long. Last time I played on TOUR was in 2007. I went to work with the golf industry, first with Fujikura, and now at Callaway, and so it had been so many years since I played in anything really other than member guests.

Our CEO, Chip Brewer, came up with the idea that maybe I should add Mid and Senior Ams to my responsibilities and get product in some influencers. So I got my amateur status back. I applied; year later I got it, and I started playing some things. The buddy was like, why don't you try to go qualify for the U.S. Am. I went to a course just out the Columbia and made it in a playoff, and then had a nice run last year.

But I feel like I played more golf now competitively, especially after last year's Senior Am. It's helped a lot and I've played more this summer. Last year was a bit of a fluke. I was so out of competition mode. I just really -- the nerves weren't quite there. I wasn't in tune with how to, you know, manage my body based on nerves.

So I've been playing more, so that does help. It's pretty rewarding to get to the finals this year for sure.

Q. Two more questions. I know you probably want to go get some rest.

MIKE SPOSA: Yeah.

Q. With this win you do have more USGA championships coming up. You now have Mid-Am exemption in a few weeks. You have U.S. Senior Open next year at Oak Tree National, and also a couple more U.S. Senior Ams as well. Just what do those opportunities mean to you?

MIKE SPOSA: Oh, gosh, I don't even want to think about playing against younger guys. I mean, I'm just going to go -- I guess I haven't even thought about that until you brought it up.

I guess just go try to have fun with them and maybe make the cut would be cool and make match play; that would be pretty cool thing to do.

But those are great things to have as a result of making it to the finals. I just really want to go and play a good round tomorrow and have a good match with Todd.

Q. Finally, tomorrow you have a big day. Also going to fly out to Ireland to support Walker Cup folks, which you are very familiar with as well.

MIKE SPOSA: Uh-huh.

Q. Do you have any well wishes for them? I know you'll see them soon.

MIKE SPOSA: Oh, boy, yeah. You know, obviously they're enjoying themselves. I'm looking at all their feeds on social media.

When that opening ceremony happens on Friday it's going to get real for them, and our boys are going to have to deal with their home crowd. I'm sure Nathan is preparing them to deal with things there. They're unbelievable golf fans over there so I don't think we'll have in any heckling, you know, instances. I hope.

They just need to be prepared that when the GB&I squad makes putts that that crowd is going to go bananas. So just stick true to your game. You know, they played Lahinch now a bunch of times. They know how to play it. I'm sure they played in different wind, and really get in their own bubbles and not get caught up in the moment.