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THE RYDER CUP MATCHES

September 23, 2006

Chris DiMarco

STRAFFAN, IRELAND

SCOTT CROCKETT: Chris, many thanks for coming and joining us this morning. Just to reiterate, ladies and gentlemen, we'll do everything in here. Chris obviously wants to go back out this afternoon and support the rest of his team which I'm sure you can understand, so do everything in here and nothing afterwards.

Obviously, not the result you wanted this morning, but it was a tough match against the Spaniards.

CHRIS DiMARCO: Yeah, they team very well together. We just didn't make any putts. It's the same thing as yesterday.

We hit it about the same distance as they did every hole. They just happened to make putts. 8, 9, 10 and 11 was the turning point in the match. We were only 1 down and José made a great 20 footer on 8 and Sergio made a 10 footer on 9, and then I missed two probably 8 , 10 footers on 10 and 11, which we could have walked away on the 12th hole 2 down if we had made those within striking distance, but we were 4 down and that's obviously a big difference to get over.

SCOTT CROCKETT: From an American perspective, a huge win for Scott and Zach in the very last match.

CHRIS DiMARCO: That was great. We were up in the team room eating lunch, and to have something to cheer about was very good. Zach chipping in, he's absolutely motivated the team. I know Tiger and Jim were both watching that and it motivated them to go out and play well.

Hopefully David and Phil can gel a little better than Phil and I have this week. You know, they played together, they have had good success together. Hopefully they can go out together and win their match.

SCOTT CROCKETT: Thanks for those comments. We'll move to some questions.

Q. Can you just talk a little about Zach and J.J. in particular, the rookies have contributed two and a half points.

CHRIS DiMARCO: Absolutely. Zach is a phenomenal putter and a tremendous competitor. And when you're putting good, it seems to bring everything back.

I know Phil and I felt like we were putting good; we just weren't making anything. And to see a few putts go in, it certainly gets the juices going, and that's what you want to see. Zach got off to a great start today, I think he birdied four of the last five, and to finish off with a chip in there, I just saw him, I said, you did it, okay, awesome, we needed it, you're the man, eat some lunch, forget about it and go out and do it again. Because you can get pumped up and then you can kind of get into a lull. Hopefully he'll just eat lunch and go right back to the first tee and keep that momentum going. And J.J. played great, too.

Q. Why do you think Tiger is beatable in this format, where in 72 hole medal play events, he seems to be untouchable? And secondly, is there any difference in the atmosphere on the American side this week versus the Presidents Cup a year ago?

CHRIS DiMARCO: No. You know, the course, it's a tough course to get the ball close. I think even watching it on TV, you're not seeing too many four to eight foot birdie putts. You're seeing a lot of 10 to 18 foot birdie putts. So it's hard to make putts. And, you know, the greens are tricky. There's a lot of little breaks in them. They are not as fast as we normally putt. I know I like fast greens. They are a little bit slower than what we normally putt.

You have to putt differently, maybe a little less break, maybe a little firmer.

And Tiger and Jim, I would put them up against anybody and I would bet my house on them. Those two, the way Jim's been hitting it and the way he's been playing lately and the way Tiger's been playing lately, it's about making putts and it's about momentum. That's what match play is about, momentum. We haven't had a chance to get that this week. We haven't had a day where you've seen three red numbers on the board and maybe only one blue. Every day, it seems through three or four holes, you see blue numbers up there. And very big momentum for us and demoralising for us, so we need to post red numbers.

Q. Just wondering, going back to last night, you touched on a little bit that last half point that they stole at the end last night and little things, like they stole the one from J.J. on 18 there, those little halves add up a little bit. Does that demoralise you a little bit, too? And not to single out the particular players, but just in general, it seems like those half points have a little bit more significance to them than you would think.

CHRIS DiMARCO: Absolutely. You want to that was a big point. We win that point yesterday, you know, that's a full point swing and a full point swing today. You're talking only a point down or two points down, or a point down going into today with J.J., going into this afternoon.

You know, hopefully our time's coming. Hopefully we'll win some matches on 18 and we'll get them back. We're just four good matches away from taking a one point lead into tomorrow. So anything can happen, they are playing good, but we just need to show some red on the board and get some motivation and get some guys I like all the matches going out there today. I'm looking at the thing, and to see, you know, the alternate shot, I think that that's what the guys we have going out we're in a good position.

Q. The idea, like you say, of you and Phil not gelling as well this time, is it really just a matter of a couple of putts?

CHRIS DiMARCO: That's it. It's nothing else to do with it. We both I think I made two birdies in the best ball yesterday. He made one, and I made one today and he made one, we made a total of five birdies in best ball. That's unacceptable. We had 35 birdie putts between us both that we didn't make. So we just didn't make any putts. We hit good putts. We hit the lip three or four times, or more than that, three or four times a day, each. We had putts that looked like they were going in, going right over the lip that didn't go in, they just didn't go in.

And you know, a putt like Phil made today on 14, you do that on hole 5 or hole 8, or something like that, it's a big momentum swing. When you're 4 down it's hard to overcome. Obviously it was very big and it gave us hope, and still, I'm not just saying him; me, too. If I can do something, make a putt early, it makes the hole smaller for them and makes the hole bigger for us. We just didn't see putts go in, and it's hard to keep the 'mo' going, when you don't see putts going in.

Q. Did you know Lehman was going to split you two up? Did you talk about it? Did you know you were sitting down this afternoon?

CHRIS DiMARCO: You know, I did not know. I figured if we had went out and won this morning, we would probably go out this afternoon. If we lost, I figured there would be a change. He put us out for three matches, gave us all the opportunity in the world to get some points; we didn't.

I'm totally comfortable with his decision. I think Phil needs to play for sure. You know, the course is really long. It's a long golf course and I'm not one of the longest guys, so I can understand the philosophy behind that, without a doubt. You know, get some guys that can carry it a little bit further than me. I hit woods into two or three holes out there, so it's playing really long.

Q. There's a buzz going around that none of the players would talk to the NBC people after their matches; is that accurate?

CHRIS DiMARCO: Never heard anything about it.

Q. Did you talk to NBC after the match?

CHRIS DiMARCO: Me and Phil both did.

Q. To Maltbie?

CHRIS DiMARCO: We talked yesterday to Jimmy Roberts.

Q. I'm talking today.

CHRIS DiMARCO: Nobody asked us.

Q. Nobody asked you?

CHRIS DiMARCO: No.

Q. No team policy on that?

CHRIS DiMARCO: No team policy on that at all.

Q. Can you identify or characterize the difference in the Sergio that you see in normal Tour competition and the Sergio everyone sees in the Ryder Cup?

CHRIS DiMARCO: He's making putts. And everybody complains that he's not a good putter everywhere else, but he's making a lot of putts this week. He just seems to make them this week for some reason.

Q. Do you sense that The European Team shows more raw emotion than the American team, and is it easier to do that when you're playing downhill as opposed to uphill?

CHRIS DiMARCO: It's just like I said before; when you're winning matches, it's fun and you're showing emotion, when you're having things to cheer for. I know yesterday I looked on the board in the afternoon, and there was only five times that we were up in a match between all four matches throughout the whole day. I mean, there was only maybe six or seven red numbers on the board the whole day, out of, what, 72 holes, 72 possible holes, there's only six or seven numbers.

So when you're not putting the numbers up, it's hard to get the momentum going. You know, when you are putting the numbers up, it's easy to show the emotion. Believe me, there was four or five times yesterday that it looked like I made a putt, I was ready to go ballistic and they lipped out and took all the wind out of your sails.

Q. How damaging has 18 been for you guys? It seems like with the exception of what Zach just did, no one can either hold onto a point or close it out when they have to on 18, and that really seems to be hurting you guys a lot.

CHRIS DiMARCO: Only way I can summarize it is the fact that when you've got a 1 up lead, you figure that you're trying to make birdie, but you're just trying not to give them the hole. So maybe you play it a little bit tentative more than you should, and when you're 1 down you're playing as aggressive as you can and you know you have to make birdie to win or eagle to win and you have nothing to lose. And it's easier, I should say.

That's the only thing I can say. You know, Darren and Lee had a one shot lead on Phil and I and they put us away with a birdie, and that's what we have to do, we have to make birdies. If you birdie 18, you're not going to lose a match.

Q. How deflating is it that it's happened a few times and it's like the last match and it's like, here we go again.

CHRIS DiMARCO: I'm just glad Zach chipped in and we didn't have to go to 18 on that one, too.

All day, if you looked at their board, they were never up until the 17th hole and J.J. hit two wonderful shots into 18, and actually hit a great first putt and hit an excellent second putt and I don't know how that didn't go. And Paul Casey made a great birdie; you just take your hat off to him.

Deflating, no. J.J. and Stewart battled their butts off all day. They were 2 down for most of the day, and for them to come back and halve that match was big.

SCOTT CROCKETT: Chris, thanks, as always, and good luck.

End of FastScripts.

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