What They’re Saying
The world’s top golf professionals have plenty of great things to say about the new look of Southern Hills Country Club. Here are a few of our favorites.
“I'm going sound like a broken record, but it's a dream come true for an Oklahoma kid to go to Oklahoma State and to play PGA Championship at Southern Hills.” – Talor Gooch
“They have added a bunch of length and they have made it a little bit more open, but at the same time, you still have to drive it really well out here. So from that aspect, I feel like it fits me really well. There's no real faking it.” – Viktor Hovland
“This is one of those places where you get on the tee box and you go, ‘man, this is a really cool hole,’ then you get to No. 2 and you’re like, ‘man, this is a really cool hole,’ and it just keeps going.” – Scottie Scheffler
“One of the things I loved is the way they've cut the runoffs, it's very hard to putt from off the greens. They're trying to get wedges in guys' hands, which I really like. It's forcing you to chip instead of just -- like whenever Pinehurst was, 2014, you could putt from sort of everywhere; where this is actually forcing you to get a wedge in your hand, which is really good. I like that.” – Rory McIlroy
“The rough is at a great length. It's interesting because you can get a ball that comes out hot or you can get a ball that doesn't come out at all. That's the great guessing game of playing Bermuda, and then with the surrounds being cut down how they are, there's a lot more grain than we ever had to deal with. There are going to be different shots. I've seen guys using hybrids, and I've seen guys use 3-woods, putts, wedges, 4-irons. You'll see a lot of different things. And then the forecast is going to be different every day in this wind. It's supposed to be all different directions. We're going to see a different golf course almost every day.” – Tiger Woods
“It just seems like a place where you just can't fake it around. You can't just kind of slash it around off the tee. I mean, the Bermuda grass makes it very difficult to control your distance in terms of approach shots into the green. You never know what you're going to get with the weather in terms of how firm and fast it's going to get. But if it gets firm and fast, this is going to be U.S. Open-like. It's going to be very difficult. It's going to be a challenge but a good, fair challenge.” – Justin Thomas