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WGC DELL TECHNOLOGIES MATCH PLAY

March 29, 2019

Tiger Woods

Austin, Texas

Q. Pretty ho-hum, Tiger?
TIGER WOODS: Yeah, well, the match he gave me -- first of all, Patrick got a bad break on 9. Hit a really nice drive down there, caught the hill, went in the hazard. And I was able to win that hole, grab a little momentum going into the back nine. Made a nice putt at 11. Won 12 and 13 was a bit of a bonus. And then I made one on 14. And just got hot right when I needed it.

Q. Can you just run us through 15.
TIGER WOODS: Well, I laid up to make sure that I put pressure on him on that tee shot, if he was going to go for it. I saw his hand go towards the driver a couple of times, and they were talking about it. And so I put it in the fairway and I thought his drive might have snuck back up into the rough back there, but from what everyone was looking at and how they were kind of looking at the golf ball, the spectators as well as the marshals, it looked like it was probably going to be on the fairway. I knew I needed to put it up there to at least have a chance at three, to force him to have a good pitch from down there and a bit of a bonus.

I think it landed pin-high, skipped back and spun back towards the hole. I tried to hit a little 60 with a little bit of cut spin to hold it against the hill and the wind, and it worked out nice.

Q. How important was 11?
TIGER WOODS: 11 was big because I had a little bit of momentum from what happened at 9 and I hit a good putt at 10. I said, just keep plugging along, it's going to turn, and eventually it really did turn, it turned pretty nicely. I made three putts and a hole-out in a four-hole stretch.

Q. (Inaudible).
TIGER WOODS: I'll be honest with you, I didn't look at the board all day. The reason being is because I needed to take care of my own match. It's irrelevant if I lose my match. So take care of my match, and then when I looked up on the board on 16 I saw he had won at 6 and 4. And so Patrick was short of the green pitching up there, so I figured I had my match in hand.

Q. Potentially now Rory?
TIGER WOODS: Potentially Rory, yeah. I know I'm teeing off at 8:30. If it's Rory or not, we'll see. And if it is Rory, we're looking forward to it. We've played tournaments together, battled each other down the stretch at events, but never in a match-play situation, so this will be fun if it works out.

Q. Before you committed to this tournament, you said, "If I go, I'll be guaranteed three great rounds." Can you agree you've had three great rounds?
TIGER WOODS: I have. I've had fun all three matches and unfortunately yesterday didn't really pan out the way I wanted it. But I'm advancing. I'm thankful for the format because I'd be going home yesterday. So I get a chance to play tomorrow morning and hopefully I can play well enough to continue advancing.

Q. Do you feel your level of comfortability (inaudible).
TIGER WOODS: It has. This golf course is tricky. There's so many moving parts on this golf course. Not only the wind comes all over the place but these mounds. The Tour staff, as I said earlier in the week, these pins are probably half a step harder than they would be in stroke play. So they're putting them in spots where, yeah, we can potentially putt off greens, chip of greens, balls are careening into tough spots. But it's match play, it's kinds of irrelevant. If you make a triple and you win the hole. No one really cares what your score is at the end of the day in relation to par. As long as you move on, and I moved on.

Q. (Inaudible).
TIGER WOODS: 83.

Q. Was there any frustration on the front nine?
TIGER WOODS: No, I gave him a couple of holes in there. Par 5, 6 I tried to hit a flop shot and came up short. And then missed one at 7, made bogey at 8. All these little things that can turn momentum in the wrong way, which I was doing that against myself.

As I said, it kind of turned at 9. He hit a good drive and got a bad break down there and I happened to win that hole and grab a little momentum going into the back nine. There is a big difference between 1-down and 2-down. For some reason it just seems like it's -- I don't know what it is, but it seems if you win a couple of holes, all of a sudden you can get up in a match versus trying to get back to all square. You're fighting, fighting, fighting. So that was big to have a little momentum going into the back nine.

Q. Did the possible weather change tomorrow, does that affect your preparation for tomorrow?
TIGER WOODS: Well, it's going to be a little bit chilly tomorrow morning. I'll have to do my normal warmup, make sure that I'm warm and keep warm. That's always going to be a challenge with me going forward with the way my back is. Just got to keep it warm and keep it moving.

Q. I know it would be a good problem to have, but if you make it through and have to play more than 18 holes, what do you make of putting yourself through that?
TIGER WOODS: Well, Joey kept saying, "The fewer amount of holes we can play, the better." But I didn't like the 2-1 finish yesterday. But I think it makes a big deal for me the fact that I've got a chance to end my match this early in the day. DJ doesn't tee off for another hour, so that would have been a bigger challenge. I get to rest all afternoon, get worked on and be ready by tomorrow morning.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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