WGC DELL TECHNOLOGIES MATCH PLAY

March 28, 2021

Billy Horschel

Austin Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. At Concession I thought your game was really close. It comes to fruition today. Congratulations match play champion.

BILLY HORSCHEL: Thank you. Yeah, it's been a lot of hard work being put in the game from my entire team and sometimes the results just take a little bit longer to show up. And we have been playing some good golf this year, just haven't put it all together and this week maybe match play was a format I needed to get the victory.

Q. After you chipped in at the 5th, you held the box for the remainder of the match. You didn't let him up. You held the box. You had honors 12 straight holes and you hit greens. That just put all kind of pressure on him on a day it was very tough to make birdies.

BILLY HORSCHEL: It was. I mean, when you get up you're just trying to make sure you don't do anything to give holes away and I didn't do a really good job of that on hole 12. I hit a wedge shot that I just hit a little too hard, and then I missed the green again with another wedge shot, No. 16. And I just did a really good job of trying to manage my game. My swing didn't feel great. I thought I figured it out on the range. I striped it on the range in between and came out here and it just wasn't there. So did a good job of just managing the game, putting the ball on the green. I putt well inside 10 feet, so I'm not worried about a 4-, 5-footer coming back or whatever. So I was just trying to get the ball on the green as quick as I could.

Q. It's hard to pick out a shot of the match but that chip in that I alluded to on the 5th was really special.

BILLY HORSCHEL: Yeah, that was a really good chip. It wasn't easy. Obviously it was back up the hill but the lie was just sitting down a little bit. There was, I mean, that's my only birdie. That's crazy my only birdie of the day was that chip in. I hit a lot of good putts early on that I thought I made that just missed and then from there it was just holding on to the reins and hopefully I didn't get bucked off.

Q. Talk about the match. Just spoke with Scottie. He said he felt like he didn't have it all day today. Did you feel that and did that force you to, maybe give you the option to be a little more conservative?

BILLY HORSCHEL: I got lucky that I had two guys that didn't, that were like me, that didn't have their A game today or even maybe their B game. I don't think -- we didn't hit very good golf shots this morning or even this afternoon and that allowed me to just be smart and not have to be aggressive and try and make birdies. Now, if Scottie would have got hot with some iron shots and started making birdies that puts a little bit of pressure on me. But it was just a tough day with this wind, trying to get close to some of these pins and the greens firming up as we played. So I'm fortunate. I had two guys today that missed some putts from inside 10 feet that they probably would make the majority of the time and that's, I think that's obviously why I'm standing here as a champion.

Q. First individual stroke play win on the PGA TOUR since nearly four years, 2017. You struggled a bit, but you worked and kept working to try to get back to the winner's circle. How gratifying is it to be validated as a champion again?

BILLY HORSCHEL: I mean, it's huge. I know I've won on TOUR and I feel like I should have won more. I should have at least contended more in some of these WGC events and Majors. I think everyone who knows me or is around me knows that I put in a tireless amount of work, day-in and day-out, and sometimes I'm hard on myself when I'm not seeing the results right away and that's why I probably haven't consistently played well week-in, week-out, year to year. I've had some ups and downs. I am trying to be a little bit easier on myself and I think this year's been a little bit better of that and it's just nice to finally see some results. Like I said, my entire team works hard and it's nice to finally see the results for all of us.

Q. Now that you have what seems to be a different outlook, not being so hard on yourself and you're seeing the results, how optimistic are you now about the future of Billy Horschel and the PGA TOUR and the world stage?

BILLY HORSCHEL: I mean, my view doesn't change. I've always felt I had the talent to compete with the best players day-in and day-out. I think the difference between me and maybe a Dustin Johnson or Rory McIlroy or Justin Thomas is just the consistency day-in and day-out. I'm just not as consistent as them and that comes down to is it, you know, mechanical, technical, mentally, is it the pressure I put on myself. It's probably a little bit of all of it. But like I said, I think the game, the stuff that Todd Anderson and I have been working on we have been seeing some good stuff and so hopefully -- we're not changing anything, we're just going to keep making little subtle changes to keep finding the right little mojo we need and hopefully be able to contend in some majors this year is the next goal.