Heading into last week, Team US hadn’t won the Solheim Cup in Europe for over a decade. Naturally, the stakes were high. When Wednesday arrived, Angel Yin acknowledged that America has struggled on European soil because Europeans play at American courses, but they rarely get the opportunity to do so. By the time the tournament concluded, the US once again had to return home empty-handed despite best efforts from the likes of World No. 1 Nelly Korda and others.  

The loss appears to have weighed heavily on Team USA captain Angela Stanford. Speaking to reporters, Stanford admitted that she made a tactical mistake that may have contributed to her side’s defeat. According to the captain, she failed to emphasize enough to her players that the greens at Bernardus Golf were expected to be unusually slow, leaving some of them struggling to adjust to the conditions. Team Europe’s captain, Anna Nordqvist, however, disagrees. 

“I mean, we’re in Europe and in September. We know how the weather can be,” Nordqvist said when asked about Stanford’s claims. “… We worked really hard… I’m not sure I believe a lot in setting up a way to fit Europe because these girls play the same golf courses week in and week out competing. So going in, I mean, we came here in July; it was, as we know, it was a very hot and dry summer, so the course played a little bit different then. 

“And then we just were trying to make sure that the greens didn’t get too firm at the time because there were some holes in the wind; it was hard to hold. So if anything, it was just really trying to manage firmness. But then it’s obviously been raining a lot in the past couple of weeks, and then this week we saw a lot of rain. So if anything, they were probably just playing a little bit softer than we all thought coming here. 

“But that’s obviously the weather; we can’t control that… Greens might have been a little bit slower, but it was nothing we really could control.”

While Nordqvist doesn’t agree with Stanford’s claims about the slow greens at Bernardus Golf last week, the US captain felt her players needed to be more aggressive with their putting, particularly after several putts came up short during the event. Stanford explained that the greens had been faster when the team visited the course earlier in the summer, making the conditions during the Solheim Cup somewhat unexpected.

Whether the slower setup existed, or whether it ultimately benefited Europe, the fact remains that Team USA still leads the overall Solheim Cup record with 11 wins to Europe’s eight, along with one tie, which came in 2024. On European soil, however, Team Europe holds the advantage with six victories compared with three for the Americans. Team USA will now have two years to reflect on the defeat and prepare for the 2028 edition, which will return to American soil.

In any case, Stanford’s comments about the slower greens may remind some fans of similar remarks made by U.S. Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley.

Keegan Bradley had a similar problem

Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley pointed to Bethpage Black’s unexpectedly soft and slow greens as one of the factors that worked against Team USA during its 15-13 loss to Europe. He admitted after the defeat that he “made a mistake” with his course setup, including reducing the rough and moving up tees, but also acknowledged that the greens never became as firm or fast as anticipated. 

“The greens were as soft as I’ve ever seen greens without it raining,” Bradley said. “Especially here, it can get pretty firm, and they never firmed up. We didn’t want the greens to be like this soft.” 

The U.S. had expected faster putting surfaces to provide an advantage, with Bradley noting that PGA Tour players typically compete on quicker greens than European players. Vice captain Jim Furyk later revealed that American players questioned whether the greens actually reached the requested 12.5 on the Stimpmeter. 

“Guys had a hard time getting putts to the hole, and it did appear to be a little gluey,” Furyk said. 

Having said that, blaming slow greens can appear to be an easy way for captains to explain away a loss. But had the Ryder Cup been played on American soil and produced the same result, would Stanford have viewed the issue in the same way?