Spieth labels Ryder Cup as ‘possibly at the very top’ of ’16 goals

CIMB Classic winner Justin Thomas caught a lot of flak two weeks ago when he told Golf Channel, without hesitation, that he’d prefer being on a winning 2016 U.S. Ryder Cup team to winning a major this year.

On Wednesday in Abu Dhabi, Jordan Spieth elevated the biennial match to a similar level.

“[The Ryder Cup is] a huge goal this year for me and possibly at the very top of the list to try and get that win as a team,” Spieth said ahead of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship.

“We are tired of hearing about changes that need to be made. We are tired of hearing about the past. And we’re ready to believe in kind of a younger, more hungry team going forward.”

The 22-year-old seemed particularly excited that the 2016 American side appears to be set to take a dip in average age.

“There’s less scar tissue there,” Spieth said, referring to the U.S. having lost eight of the last 10 Ryder Cups. “Rickie (Fowler) has been on I think two losing teams. I’ve been on one. You’ve got guys like Brooks (Koepka) and Justin (Thomas) and Patrick (Reed), a number of guys who are young, fiery, have good success in different team environments going back to their amateur and junior days.”

A member of the losing U.S. side in the 2014 debacle at Gleneagles, Spieth is planning to forget that experience at Hazeltine, hoping to hit the Reset button.

“We’re going to go in believing that it’s just a completely clean slate,” he said. “The Ryder Cup trend in our mind, when we get there this year, it starts over. That’s the strategy we are going to take.

Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.

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