Career-best 63 has Emma Talley feeling ‘like myself again’

Emma Talley had her first top-10 finish of the season after shooting a career-best 63 Sunday. (LPGA Photo)

Kentuckian Emma Talley made it look easy Sunday at the Volunteers of America Classic at Old American Golf Club in Texas when she had eight birdies, including four straight to end the round, and shot a career-low 63. That let her finish the tourney 12-under par and jumped her into a tie for fourth place, her first top 10 finish this season. Talley won $63,320.

She opened the tourney with a 6-under par 65 to tie her low round on the LPGA Tour and said then she thought the hard work and coaching changes she had made were starting to pay off. But she came back with a 2-over par 73 and even-par 71 the next two rounds before playing a near-perfect round Sunday.

Here is what Talley had to

Q. Emma, a bogey-free day, a career day, looking at your sixth career Top 10 on the LPGA Tour. I imagine this week with the ups and downs of the weather and maybe a little bit in your game turned out a lot nicer than you may have anticipated.

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah, I actually wore my birdie shirt today just to give me some luck, and I think I it did give me some good luck today. Yeah, I started strong and I finished strong. The two rounds in the middle were kind of Meh, but I’ll take it for sure.

Q. You finished today in a flurry. Five birdies over your last six holes, including a birdie at 17 the Aon Risk Reward hole. Where did that come from?

EMMA TALLEY: I think I was just on a mission a little bit. I kind of got in the groove with my putter on the last few holes and I was hitting good shots. For me personally, the last shot into the last between was huge for me. I told my caddie walking up to the 18th green, that right there was so much to me because I have been struggling for really the last six months. That meant a lot to me, so I feel like I’m back to being myself a bit.

Q. When you can look at just maybe the last year, the last Top 10 you had was at the 2020 Marathon Classic. Oddly enough, that’s next week. So you’re getting right in tune for that event. When you can put together a performance like this and kind of find a groove on the course and maybe even off the course with the team that you have around you, how good does it feel?

EMMA TALLEY: It feels so good. I finally feel like myself again. For the last couple years on the golf course, it’s just been kind of hard to even want to play sometimes. I’ve definitely thought about maybe quitting a few parts of it. So I knew though then I got my team around me that I could get through it and I did. Like I said, this has been really fun, and I hope it continues.

Q. You mentioned a unique story of a family friend renewed today.

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah.

Q. Take us through who it was, what his name is, and the connection there.

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah, one of my dad’s friends from high school 50 years ago, they haven’t talked since high school. He lives on the golf course, so he came out today. So now I asked him if he can come next week, too. He watched all 18 holes and he was really excited. He’s a member out here so he thought it was amazing, and I couldn’t be more thankful to have fans, and in general, like having fans back has been just so amazing.

Q. What’s his name?

EMMA TALLEY: Charlie Miller.

Q. No better name than that to fit on Old American Golf Club I would imagine.

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah.

Q. Momentum heading into next week. Like we mentioned, your last Top 10 was Toledo, Ohio for the Marathon Classic. You have to be feeling good with where everything is heading into this event?

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah, that tournament the last three years has treated me really well. I’m excited to get to the Toledo. I’m going to go home tonight to Nashville and sleep this my own bed before I go to Toledo. So I’m excited for next week, and hopefully, I can keep the mojo going for the event.

Q. When you can shoot a career-low and just, I don’t know, reflect on it tonight on the flight, how do you use that to launch something even better?

EMMA TALLEY: Yeah, I think for sure I thought about that on 17 walking up. Like I need to start writing down some things I did this week, my mentality this week, and just how I kind of played my game the whole way through and never had wandering eyes, so that’s really important for me.