July 4, 2021 | BY AAGD STAFF
Timothy O’Neal competeted in the men’s division of The John Shippen, a 36-hole individual stroke play event, with the winner receiving an exemption into the PGA TOUR’s Rocket Mortgage Classic (July 1-4 at Detroit Golf Club). O’Neal (Savannah, Georgia/Jackson State University) shot a 71-68—-139 in the event to finish 5-under par and win by two strokes over Kevin Hall.
Participating in the Rocket Mortgage Classic O’Neal shot 74-73—147 (3-over par). The post-tournament interview follows:
Q. Just kind of start off from the beginning, kind of give us a little recap of Shippen earlier this week.
TIM O’NEAL: Well, yeah, so I get here Friday. Just everything?
Q. Yeah, just kind of like just how it felt to win the inaugural Shippen.
TIM O’NEAL: Okay. Yeah, after playing good on Monday and qualifying for the Shippen and then getting to play in the Rocket Mortgage, that was huge. The people here in Detroit have been unbelievable. They’ve embraced me like I’m one of their own and it’s been a really nice week. Wish I would have played a little bit better. I putted horrible this whole week, but sometimes that’s golf and you just move on to the next tournament.
Q. Earlier this week you were playing with Bubba. Just kind of talk a little bit about reconnecting with Bubba and getting a practice round in with him.
TIM O’NEAL: Yeah, most of the time whenever I qualify for a PGA TOUR event, if he’s there we usually get a practice round in to kind of catch up. I traveled with Bubba when he was playing with Korn Ferry Tour and it’s just nice to catch up and talk about the course a little bit and just old times.
Q. And then another one, reconnecting with Jason Day at the 313 Celebrity Scramble, just talk about that experience.
TIM O’NEAL: Yeah, that was nice playing in the celebrity tournament there. We were able to win and it was good to see Jason again. I played Nationwide Tour with Jason as well. This whole week’s been really great. Sorry I have to leave on Friday, but it’s been a great week and hopefully I’ll get a chance to do it again.
Q. The past two days, just kind of like just talk about what was going right, what was going wrong. I mean, your approaches for the most part were good.
TIM O’NEAL: Yeah, for the most part I hit it really well. I only missed two greens the first day and had two bogeys, didn’t have any birdies. Today, just didn’t make — I made a few birdies, but I just missed too many putts. I was in range to make putts and I think I was last in Strokes Gained: Putting. You have to make some putts and I made hardly none. I have to work on my putting. I just couldn’t figure the greens out this week. Sometimes it’s like that.
Q. Just overall, the entire week and how cool it was to tee it up in a PGA TOUR event.
TIM O’NEAL: Oh, it’s been great for me to qualify, the John Shippen exemption. They’ve done a good job with this whole thing and just to get a chance to play in the Rocket Mortgage and tee it up with the best players in the world, it’s been an awesome week.
