WGC DELL TECHNOLOGIES MATCH PLAY

March 25, 2023

Rory McIlroy

Austin Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. Nice playing, Rory. Xander was just up here and said you made a lot of putts in like the four- to eight-feet range where you had to have them and you made them. Is it gratifying to you to have everybody talking about that in addition to the driving?

RORY McILROY: Yeah. Both ends of the bag are working pretty well, and the stuff in the middle is not too bad, either. Yeah, I putted well all day. I felt yesterday against Keegan I found something or I got a feel, and then putted really good this morning against Lucas, and then continued that this afternoon.

My speed was a little off early on. I think just because the greens were drying out as the day went on. They just got a little bit faster. Sort of once I figured that out and holed a nice putt for 2 on 4, got my eye in and saw one go in, yeah, it was really good after that.

Q. No nerves on the putt on 18?

RORY McILROY: I mean, yeah. Yeah, some nerves. I'm sort of -- I feel like I get more nervous watching my opponent play because you just don't know what they're going to do. You're in no control of what they do.

At least with my stuff I'm in control of it, so I sort of feel like not as many nerves. But yeah.

But yeah, I feel like I got lucky. I expected my ball to be Xander's ball on 18 behind that tree, and I got fortunate that mine trundled down the hill and obviously made the chip shot a lot easier.

Q. 18 has been friendly to you today. You had a great chip on 18 in the morning.

RORY McILROY: Yeah, it's sort of been friendly to me all week. Yeah, hopefully if I can play a little bit better, I don't need to play 18 tomorrow. But we shall see.

Q. I'm sure you want to win every time you tee it up, but is there anything special about this week being the last one?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, I mean, I haven't really thought much about it, but yeah. I think winning the Match Play is always a massive accomplishment because of what you have to go through. It's seven rounds and -- especially this week, I feel like a lot of my matches have been really, really close, so to be able to pull them out when I've needed to has been very gratifying.

Yeah, maybe a higher sense of satisfaction when you get through on Sunday night and you're able to win. I feel like it's maybe just more of an achievement mentally to do it rather than just winning a four-round stroke-play event.

Q. Xander said on 18 his perception was that you thought his ball might be yours. When he walked by he was kind of like -- is that true?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, I was walking up there expecting it to be a TaylorMade ball and I saw a Callaway on it, and I was as surprised as anyone, because mine was further left than Xander's off the tee. Look, you need a little bit of fortune in these things, and that was a bit of luck for me today.

Q. On 17 you switched from the wedge to the putter. Sort of nervous watching you with a wedge. Why did you switch?

RORY McILROY: Just wasn't quite a good enough lie to slide the bounce underneath the ball. I felt like if I got it absolutely perfect, but the margin for error was so small that if it just bounced at all it's 25 feet away.

So I just felt like a bad putt beats a bad chip there every time, so that's why I switched to the putter.

Q. How hard is it to derail Scottie who's won 10 matches in a row here?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, I'm not even -- I've got a match before I potentially get there, so I need to focus on either Cam or Kurt tomorrow. But Scottie has been unbelievable. He's been so dominant since this time last year and what he's won and being No. 1 in the world for quite a big chunk of that time.

I played the first two days with him at THE PLAYERS a couple weeks ago and just super impressive what he's doing.

Q. Is there anything you can take from here to the Ryder Cup this year?

RORY McILROY: No, the majority of points for play at the Ryder Cup are the team elements, the four-balls and the foursomes. I don't think you can look too much into it.