DeLaet overcomes nerves at Presidents Cup
DUBLI N, Ohio — It wasn’t exactly how captain Nick Price would have drawn it up, but what international golf match ever is?
Price sent Graham DeLaet and Jason Day out to get the International team off to a strong start in the Day 1 better-ball matches of the Presidents Cup — and after DeLaet conquered his nerves to birdie the first hole, the plan went straight south.
Three down after six holes on the heels of five straight birdies by the U.S. team of Brandt Snedeker and Hunter Mahan, the Internationals’ leadoff pair — heck, the whole team — was treading water.
Luckily, a whole bunch of it came crashing down on Muirfield Village, out of the sky, and an 82-minute rain delay midway through the round seemed to change everything for the visitors.
Day and DeLaet were only one-down when the weather blew in, but after play resumed, the 31-year-old from Weyburn, Sask., birdied the 15th and 16th — hitting his tee shot on the latter to within 16 inches of the hole — to give them a one-up lead with two to play.
And after Snedeker holed a 20-footer on 17 to square the match, Day stuck the dagger in on the 18th, rolling in a 25-foot, left-to-right slider for birdie and the first International point, starting a rally that left them only one point back of the Americans, 3-1/2 to 2-1/2, at the end of the day.
“I’ve never been so nervous in my life (on the first tee), the only thing I can compare it to is when I was proposing to my wife,” said DeLaet, who actually had his tee in the ground, readying to hit the opening shot of the matches, when he was told the U.S. team had the honour ... er, honor.
“Yeah, there was a little bit of confusion there,” he said. “I was told we were second, then I was told we were first, so I teed it up and then I kind of looked like an idiot out there.
“But, but I was super-nervous, I was. And I was able to make a birdie, somehow, because I honestly could barely feel my hands, and my legs were shaking — it was a pretty cool moment, and something I will treasure and remember for the rest of my life.”
He might as well get used to the heat: he and Day are out first again in Friday’s alternate-shot matches, against even bigger game, Phil Mickelson and Keegan Bradley.
“We couldn’t wait to get back out on the course and play,” Day said. “Graham hits the ball so well. I just wanted a shot at birdie on the last hole. I felt that if I didn’t hole that put it was almost guaranteed that one of the (American) blokes was going to hole the putt for an all-square.