Rory McIlroy defends his Masters title for his sixth career major championship

Rory McIlroy became the fourth player to defend his Masters Tournament title, his second major championship in his last five tries, and sixth career major championship, prevailing on Sunday at Augusta National by one shot over Scottie Scheffler. 

Winning the 90th Masters Tournament, in the press conference afterward, Rory was asked: Last year you completed the career grand slam, and this year became the fourth player to defend your title. Could you share your emotions after going back to back?"

RORY McILROY: I thought it was so difficult to win last year because of trying to win the Masters and the grand slam, and then this year I realized it's just really difficult to win the Masters. I tried to convince myself it was both.

"Yeah, just incredible. I obviously did the bulk of my work on Thursday and Friday. I don't think I would have believed anyone if they said to me all you have to do is shoot even-par for the weekend and you'll win. I definitely thought I was going to need to go out there and at least shoot a couple of under-par scores.

"The course in the afternoon - yesterday the course was gettable pretty much all day, but today the wind was up a little bit. It was gusty. It made things definitely a little more tricky, especially on the back nine.

"Yeah, I just had to hang in there. I did a decent green session last night and tried to figure a couple of things out, and I definitely hit my irons better today. I think I struck the ball better today overall, which was good to see, but I still needed to rely on my short game those last few holes.

"The up-and-down on 16 and the up-and-down on 17 were huge.

"Yeah, just absolutely delighted to be able to get it done. Having a six-shot lead going into the weekend, it would have been a bitter pill to swallow if I wasn't able to get myself over the finish line.

Question: "Rory, the tee shot on 12, can you just take us through what you were trying to do, and if that was the line you were going for, what club you hit, all that stuff."

RORY McILROY: "It was in off the left. That was where the wind was. I waited - this is going back to one of my first-ever practice rounds here. I played a practice round with Tom Watson in 2009, and he said to me on the 12th tee he always waited until he felt where the wind should be and then just hit it. You know, just hit it as soon as you can.

"That's what I did on 12. It was all over the place. When I stood up on the tee, it felt like it was off the right, and I looked at the 11th flag, it was blowing right to left. But I was patient, and I waited to feel where the wind should have been coming from, and I knew it was just a perfect 3/4 9-iron.

"I aimed it at the middle of the bunker. Probably didn't anticipate it to drift as far right as it did. That's why you give yourself a little bit of margin for error. That was a really good golf shot at the right time and probably a golf shot I wouldn't have been able to hit yesterday if I didn't go to the range and try to figure a few things out and try to neutralize the ball flight a little bit.

"Yeah, absolutely huge, huge shot in the tournament."

Question: "Walk us through the third shot on 15."

RORY McILROY: So I wanted to lay back to where I could put enough spin on the ball. You're coming off that downslope to a very, very firm green, and I thought if I left myself too short of a yardage, then a wedge shot could skip through the green, especially with the wind being behind our back.

"So I laid it up to a number that was like -- I think I had 108 or 107 to the pin, trying to pitch it like 100, seven or eight paces short and just let it skip up, which is a perfect 3/4 lob wedge for me with that little bit of help.

"I think sometimes like you're going off a downslope, it's in a little bit of a valley area, and with wedge shots in particular with the wind, instead of the wind carrying the ball, it sort of knocked it down, and it didn't carry anywhere near as far as it needed to. Thankfully it hung up. It was pretty close to coming back into the water. Thanking my lucky stars with that one.

Question: "Rory, what do you think this tournament and this golf course has taught you about life?

RORY McILROY: Good things come to those who wait maybe. Just keep going. I find myself in a very similar position today to where I was in the last round last year, two or three behind, but I played solid golf after that.

"I was 4-under for an 11-hole stretch there, which is what I needed to do to give myself that cushion going up the last. I just tried really hard to focus on myself. I thought, if I could get to 14-under, I thought that everyone else would struggle to get to that score. So that was the number I had in my head. I got to 13 on the last and had that two-shot cushion.

"I didn't quite get there, but yeah, just keep going. Keep your head down and keep it going. If you put the hours in and work on the right things, eventually it will come good for you."

Question: "Along the same lines, Rory, this game has such odd mystery to it. What is it about this game where the player is never exactly the same one day to the next?"

RORY McILROY: "It's very - you have a lot of time to think. You're out there a long time. There's a long time between shots. There's a long time between rounds.

"I think it is - of all the big sports, I do think it is the most mental. It's the most challenging mentally. I think it's hard to stay in the same mental space for four days in a row because even -- I was in a great mental space, like say on the 13th tee shot, for example. All of my practice rounds up here, the weeks leading into it, Monday, Tuesday, great. I hit two left on Wednesday off the tee. Then Thursday, Friday, Saturday, I didn't sniff hitting the fairway.

"So it's just there's little things that happen that just start to make you second guess things. It's just very hard to stay on the right -- not in the right spot mentally, but the same spot mentally for a long period of time."