Q. Really solid round, put yourself in contention for the next two days. What in particular is working well?
ANDREW NOVAK: I've been putting well. I feel pretty comfortable on these greens. Obviously grew up not too far from here, so this is the stuff I grew up putting on.
I've had a good feel for the speed, and off the tee, I haven't put myself in too many bad spots. So I've been able to maximize my opportunities to make birdies.
Q. This season you had a bunch of toppers followed by missed cuts, been kind of volatile. Anything that explains maybe why, when you're playing well, it's peak weeks, and when it's not going well on others.
ANDREW NOVAK: I've been fighting the swing a little bit. Even today I had a couple of swings where it's a little loose on what I'm trying to do. On the weeks when it's been rough, it's been hard to kind of find it.
It is on this TOUR a little bit better to have the top finishes and poor finishes. Better that than finishing 30 every week. So I'm cool with it. Ideally I'd like to tighten up some of the swings. But this week's been pretty solid.
Q. Is what you have with your game, is it enough?
ANDREW NOVAK: To win?
Q. Yes.
ANDREW NOVAK: Yes, absolutely. I keep putting myself in position. Especially lately, the way I've been putting, I think statistically last year, I showed like I could, from tee to green, basically keep up.
I was definitely lagging behind with the putting. I think what I've shown this year with the putting, when I put it together each week, I keep putting myself in contention. One of these times, I do think will go my way. Just got to get more comfortable in those situations.
Q. Something you worked on with your putting over the off-season that made it better?
ANDREW NOVAK: Just testing basically. I got a new putter. I changed basically the flange of the putter, the neck of the putter. I've gone to a little bit different mold. I went from a plumber's neck to a slant neck, and that -- to get technical, basically I was over rotating the face through. I was basically pulling every putt, and I was just adjusting through that.
The slant neck was allowing the face to open up more on the takeaway. So when it comes through and I'm closing it, it's basically squaring it up a lot more consistently for me. I'm actually starting putts on my line and not having to deal with pulling every putt and adjusting.
Q. I think what I meant, if I could try again for a more intelligent question, when you talk about tightening things up, are you in the midst of changing anything or do things kind of get loose every now and then?
ANDREW NOVAK: Yes, things do get loose. Houston was where it really kind of -- I don't want to say rock bottom. I definitely hit worse than that. That was really where it kind of bottomed out. I was really struggling with some things.
Got with my coach. He actually came out to Valero. We got some things together. I wouldn't say Valero was perfect. I managed my game really well that week. There was still a few hiccups with the irons.
It's coming along. It's not perfect. It's never going to be perfect. It's golf. It's just something I've been working on.
I can hit the ball well enough to play here. I've just got to be conscious of what I'm doing and trust what I'm doing when I'm going into shots.
Q. Since you brought the word up, from the time you left college, what was rock bottom? Have you had one of those rock bottom moments?
ANDREW NOVAK: My worst ball striking was definitely out of COVID. I probably missed -- I won a Korn Ferry event right before COVID.
Q. The one in Florida?
ANDREW NOVAK: Right. And we came out, and I think I missed 12 of 14 cuts from that summer on through that year. I was fighting my swing bad. I had to put a lot of work in that off-season to kind of figure things back out.
I would say that's about as frustrated as I've been with my swing in the past.
Q. Frustrated is a nice word for rock bottom.
ANDREW NOVAK: Yeah.
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