Q. Wet conditions out there; how would you assess your third round.
HARRY HIGGS: Thrilled. Thrilled to shoot under par. I'm not great in the rain. Today was hopefully some good momentum for rain golf for what seems like we're going to do again tomorrow. Yeah, just guessing all day, and fortunately I guessed most of the time, and stayed in it, didn't lose my mind, which was nice.
Q. Where does this round compare to other rounds in the rain?
HARRY HIGGS: This is by far the best. I probably have never shot under par in the rain. I went and played in Australia the second event that we were over there, the Australian Open. It was basically like this both Saturday and Sunday, and I did okay. I kind of tried to remember that, how wild it is, what the ball does as soon as you hit it.
The drive I hit on 18, it probably curved four or five different ways. I felt like I hit it 90 yards right and it came back to the middle of the fairway. So obviously some of it is dumb luck just trying to stay as dry as possible, keep the golf ball as dry as possible. But for me personally, today was fantastic in this rain.
Q. That final birdie on 18, walk me through off the tee box. Looked like you weren't happy with it.
HARRY HIGGS: Yeah, I think it cut 15 yards and then drew 20 all in the span of roughly 290 yards that it traveled. Then it started to -- the rain started to dissipate a little bit and I hit a nice 7-iron and holed a putt.
I was just thrilled hitting that tee shot that I kept the golf club in my hand and that I got it airborne and it was, again, dumb luck that it went -- I think it was right on the center stripe of the fairway, too, which I don't know that I deserved that but I certainly took it and took advantage of it.
Q. You shared with us earlier you're allowing yourself to get upset but trying to quickly turn the page. Did you put that to the test today?
HARRY HIGGS: Oh, yeah. Made a 6 on the fourth hole, par-5, with an 8-iron from the middle of the fairway. As you could imagine, I was not very happy with that.
But then I did; I told myself don't get too aggressive on -- I think it's 5. 5 is a par-3. Just kind of work it into the middle of the green, and then I got over a 30-some-odd-footer, and I was like, you know what, I am going to make this; I'm not going to wallow in my own sorrow for the next however many hours we're going to be out here. I'm going to make this putt and I'm going to get the day going. Holed that and holed another one on the next hole and just scrapped and clawed to finish, and it was nice obviously -- they were all pretty much bonus birdies other than the one on 15. A lot of luck to get that ball to four and a half feet on 18.
Hit a nice shot on 17, and that was another one that was like, might as well just make this putt. So hopefully do a bunch of that tomorrow.
I don't need to stay calm. I just need to get over it, get over it sooner than I -- quicker than I have in the past.
Q. What do you have on your yardage book? Are they words or sayings or --
HARRY HIGGS: Yeah, it was like, don't -- it's not afraid, but don't be afraid -- feel the energy, feel the anger, feel the frustration, feel the joy, feel the nervousness, and then don't let it use you, use it. So use it to sharpen your focus or use it to allow you to get in the shot more confident it might be.
And then the second part, there's some bad words written in there, but the non-colorful version is just be a savage, just don't -- whatever you have to do to beat everybody that's here, do that. It's not always going to be that way, but I have a chance to beat everybody that played this week tomorrow, and that's why we get out of bed and do all this stuff and deal with the rain. I didn't go to journalism school to sit in here when it rains; I'm so thrilled for the chance I have tomorrow. It doesn't mean I'm going to win, but I'm enjoying -- I'm going to enjoy the 18 more holes to go.
Q. Past success last year on the Korn Ferry TOUR; what experiences are you going to draw upon for tomorrow?
HARRY HIGGS: Yeah, that almost a year ago -- yeah, a little under a year ago, two times in a row I beat everybody that played in the golf tournament. Yeah, certainly you could say that the field this week is maybe a little bit better, but you're splitting hairs there. Yeah, just that, that when we tee it up for four days, I can beat everybody that's there, and so can everybody else here. I just hope that it's my time tomorrow.
Q. The golf course, you obviously played it well. Do you think it holds up well for a full-field event if it were to come this way?
HARRY HIGGS: Yeah, 100 percent, without a doubt. It could use probably a little bit more length. We talked about this earlier; golf is an outdoor sport. Weather matters. If it doesn't rain here and it's warm and they can get the greens to have a bounce -- they were a little firmer even Tuesday and Wednesday when we were going around, this golf course is quite challenging.
Yeah, today probably the scores towards the ends of the day just with the rain kind of fell off a little bit, but 13-under through 54 holes, that's pretty hard nowadays. Length doesn't really matter. You can probably lengthen a few holes out here and make it a little harder. Sometimes you lengthen a hole, it makes it easier, too.
Yeah, I would love to see it. I think the town and the golf course, everything that goes on here, I think it deserves a full-field event. It's first class. There's not five events on TOUR that I've played that are better than this. Everything included, golf course, people, fans, the treatment of idiots like me in here, food, locker room, everything. It's been great. I've really enjoyed it.
Q. Obviously today you played well. Given the conditions, tomorrow is supposed to be a little bit rougher than today in terms of the weather. How do you prepare yourself mentally for that type of round knowing that you're in contention but also the weather given what you were able to do today but just added pressure that you're right there in the mix to win this thing?
HARRY HIGGS: Yeah, that's a great question. I have no idea is probably the honest answer. Get away from here and dry out and try to get as much sleep as possible and then just kind of wake up and see what we're dealing with, get my golf clubs to dry out.
Yeah, if we play in this tomorrow, the unfortunate part is so much is going to be out of your control. Golfers love to control everything and we can't control really hardly anything. And when it's sunny and 75 there's a few more things you can control. If you get some wild ones tomorrow in the rain that wiggle offline as soon as you hit them, sometimes the ball just doesn't want to cooperate in the rain. Do your best to score from there. Then you're kind of hoping that everybody else is also struggling with the same thing.
Yeah, I think I need to probably sit with my thoughts maybe with a cold beer and think about how I'm going to deal with tomorrow, especially if it's going to be like today, because I did a pretty good job today, but boy, we were teetering on that edge of Harry was going to lose his mind and become a detriment to my own self.
Here we go; Harry talks in circles. I think that's kind of the mindset tomorrow is just don't be a detriment to yourself. If I get a handful of drives or iron shot, whatever it may be, that wiggle offline and get in bad spots and make a few bogeys and don't win, I can't do anything about that, but as long as I don't cause it, quote-unquote, by being a detriment to myself, then I'll be happy with the result tomorrow.
Q. What does tonight look like? Dad is in town with you?
HARRY HIGGS: Dad is in town. We stayed with Joel and Geno. Joel went home yesterday after two not-great days, but he was thrilled to go back and be a dad.
Geno has stayed. Geno was in charge of going and getting stuff and should be making tacos right now as we speak. So yeah, hopefully Geno did what he said he was going to do because it was quite a miserable day for me, my caddie and my dad, who was just walking today. Yeah, hopefully we get home and there's tacos ready for us and we can take a hot shower, put our feet up, watch some sports, and I'll go to bed probably pretty early today.
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