PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – On the 10-year anniversary of Adam Scott’s victory here at The Players Championship, he noted that not all aftereffects were positive ones.
“I think inexperience and being a bit naive at that point probably worked against me,” he said of winning this tournament at 23. “I didn’t realize to keep going up to that next level how much harder I probably would have to work. You just think it’s all going to come along; everything did to that point in my career. And I kept winning and playing good, but I never really performed like that on any other big event for quite awhile.”
Scott won again three months later, but it took nearly two-and-a-half years for his next PGA Tour victory after that.
He maintained that the experience helped him learn from winning in more recent years.
“Whereas winning the Masters last year was a similar kind of thing, where I felt like I can’t waste this chance and this opportunity and the momentum and confidence that gives me, and I think I did a good job of that. So I definitely learned something out of my experience 10 years ago.”