By Fitzgerald Cecilio

Going with both youth and experience, Davis Love III has used his captain pick to select veterans Jim Furyk, Dustin Johnson and Steve Stricker and first-timer Brandt Snedeker to the 12-man US Ryder Cup team.

The 39th edition of the Ryder Cup will be played Sept. 28-30 at Medinah Country Club's No. 3 course near Chicago.

Furyk, Johnson and Stricker have a total of 10 US Ryder Cups against the Europeans. Furyk and Stricker were part of the teams that lost in Wales in 2010 and won at Valhalla in 2008 while Johnson has one Ryder Cup appearance to his name. The combined record of Furyk, Johnson and Stricker in Ryder Cup competition is 12-20-7.

Love opted to pick Johnson due to his strong performance during the past two weeks of the Tour's FedEx Cup playoffs, in which he tied for third at The Barclays and tied for fourth at the Deutsche Bank Championship.

Love also took into consideration Stricker's victory at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions and Johnson's win at the FedEx St. Jude Classic.

The 31-year-old Snedeker has never played on a Ryder or Presidents cup team and was not on the initial short list that included Rickie Fowler, Hunter Mahan, Furyk and Stricker after finishing 13th in the points standings when he missed the cut at the PGA Championship.

Snedeker won early in the season at the Farmers Insurance Open and has had a strong run in the past three weeks - tied for 28th at the Wyndham Championship, second at The Barclays and sixth at last week's Deutsche Bank.

Ranked 18th in the Official World Golf Ranking, Snedeker is the 10th-highest-ranked American and first on Tour in the strokes gained-putting category.

The four will join Tigers Woods, Bubba Watson, Jason Dufner, Keegan Bradley, Webb Simpson, Zach Johnson, Matt Kuchar and Phil Mickelson, who earlier qualified after finishing in the top eight of the Ryder Cup standings.

They will go up against the best of Europe, including No. 1 Rory McIlroy, Justin Rose, Graeme McDowell, Paul Lawrie, Francesco Molinari, Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Peter Hanson, Sergio Garcia, Martin Kaymer, Ian Poulter and Nicolas Colsaerts. Jose Maria Olazabal will captain the team.

 

 

Davis Love III Announces Captain's Picks for US Ryder Cup team