Six things we learned from The Presidents Cup

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Tiger Woods gave the U.S. two points at The Presidents Cup, including one from a singles win.

Admit it. You're probably still trying to catch up on your sleep after staying up late a few nights to watch The Presidents Cup.

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Maybe you passed off your yawns at the morning staff meeting as a result of the neighbor's barking dog. Maybe you even called in sick and informed the office that you might be a few minutes late. But it was obviously Aussie inflicted.

There's no doubt The Presidents Cup offered some compelling television. It was served as an excellent travel advertisement for Australia. The weather, while windy, looked great, especially with gloomy skies and rains becoming the norm in North America. And there's something about a kangaroo that will usually elicit a smile.

But those who stayed up late and sucked down a few energy drinks the next day learned more than just a few things about wombats and dingoes. We found out quite a bit about the state of golf among the elite players in the United States, most of them quite positive.

Here are six things we learned from watching the Presidents Cup:

Tiger Woods is close to being back. Even the casual observer could tell that Woods was fully involved in the matches and not just going through the motions. He got dragged down somewhat by his partner a couple of times in team competition, but he looked like his old self against Aaron Baddeley in the singles match, where he only made one bogey. And he was making putts like he hasn't made for two years. "I'm pleased with the progress I've made and it's finally paying off under pressure," Woods said. "It held up nicely this week." The signs are there. A Tiger return is near.

Hunter Mahan has gotten past his Ryder Cup moment. He broke down in Wales after failing to seal the deal in the Ryder Cup a year ago and there were questions on what the long-term effect might be. That wasn't a problem this time, as the cool cat from Oklahoma State went 4-1 and dusted off Jason Day in singles. Mahan looks like a guy who's going to be a regular in the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup matches for a long, long time.

Jim Furyk is money. It's too early to write off Furyk after his poor 2011 season on the PGA TOUR. Did he miss a putt all week? If he did they weren't shown on television. Furyk went 5-0 and became the first 40-year-old to go undefeated in the competition. Just goes to prove that there's no age restriction in international play.

Bubba Watson and Webb Simpson may be playing together for quite a while. Watson has the creativity and the power, while Simpson is steady as a rock. And Watson knew what to do and say to calm and reassure Simpson in his first international competition as a professional. They proved to be quite a winning combination for foursomes and could easily be playing alternate-shot together when the Ryder Cup pairings are announced for Medinah in 2012. David Toms isn't done just yet.

Phil Mickelson really is a team player. Lefty asked to play with Furyk in the foursomes, a request that seemed to invigorate Furyk. The duo won three matches before Mickelson was asked to take a seat in order to rest up for the singles draw, but wound up losing to Adam Scott. "We had a lot of fun doing it," Mickelson said.

Fred Couples is the ideal captain for The Presidents Cup. The players would likely vote Couples as the permanent captain. He's been able to make the event enjoyable and enable the players to have fun under tough circumstances. There's even a movement -- started by Tiger -- to allow Couples the opportunity to captain the Ryder Cup team.

The question is whether the momentum will be transferrable to the Ryder Cup in 2012. Davis Love III is the captain and he and Couples are BFFs, but his style will certainly be different. And the atmosphere at the Ryder Cup is a "little edgy" according to Couples. "The Ryder Cup is the Ryder Cup," he said.

While the next big international event is almost a year away, you can almost start imagining what could happen. How does Watson and Simpson against Luke Donald and Ian Poulter sound for the first foursomes match? How about Mickelson and Furyk against Lee Westwood and Martin Kaymer? How about Tiger Woods vs. Rory McIlroy?

We can hardly wait.