WGC DELL TECHNOLOGIES MATCH PLAY

March 22, 2023

Rory McIlroy

Austin Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. New putter, new driver, as well. How important to see those clubs under pressure this week?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, really good. That's the main thing this week. Obviously there's a ton of golf left this season, but to get a little bit of match play in our lives is good and get under pressure. There's a couple of putts on the back nine there that I was actually glad I had the hole. It's good practice, but at the same time I want to win the match, as well.

Yeah, it was good. It was a good first starting for both those clubs, and they both performed pretty well.

Q. Stallings wouldn't go away all day, but how about the shot at the par-3 to close him out?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, that was a nice three-quarter 9-iron in there. He won the last two holes of the front nine to go back to 1, and I played a solid back nine, shot 4-under par to close him out.

It was good. After the disappointment of the week at THE PLAYERS for myself to come back out and play like this first day back out with a couple of new pieces of equipment, it feels good.

Q. You put some new weapons in the bag; what was your evaluation after this first match?

RORY McILROY: Driver was good. Driver was really good. I'm much happier with where I am there. Obviously off the tee is such an important part of the game for me.

Putter was good. Struggled a little bit with the speed, so I'll probably go work on that a little bit this afternoon. But overall pretty happy with my win.

Q. You hung around all day and hit a beautiful shot here at 17 to finish things off. How would you describe the day?

RORY McILROY: It was solid. You know, I think I birdied most of the holes that you should birdie out there. I didn't make many mistakes apart from a short little missed putt on the 8th hole. Overall, six birdies, one bogey. It was a pretty decent day and some tricky wind. The course was obviously soft after the rain the last couple days. Happy to get the win and move on to tomorrow.

Q. A little switcharoo with the driver length and also a new putter in the bag?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, so I used 44 inches in the driver most of last year. I went back to 44½ at the start of this year with the new driver because, it's funny, I don't like a lot of loft on the driver, and it just wasn't spinning enough for me, so I needed to go to a new shaft. If I wasn't going to get the spin from the loft, I needed to get it from somewhere else. So I went to a slightly softer shaft, and it's actually really helped. I feel like I can hit a few more shots with it. It sort of hangs in there a little bit for me. It did pretty well today.