 | |
| Tournament information | |
|---|---|
| Location | Austin, Texas |
| Established | 1999 |
| Course | Austin Country Club |
| Par | 71 |
| Length | 7,108 yards (6,500 m) |
| Organized by | International Federation of PGA Tours |
| Tour(s) | PGA Tour European Tour |
| Format | Match play |
| Prize fund | US$20,000,000 |
| Month played | March |
| Final year | 2023 |
| Tournament record score | |
| Score | 18-hole match: 9 and 8Tiger Woods (2006) Championship: 8 and 7Tiger Woods (2008) |
| Final champion | |
 Sam Burns | |
 2023 WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play | |
| Location map | |
TheWGC Match Play, titled in later years as theWGC-Dell Technologies Match Play for sponsorship reasons, was a professional men'sgolf tournament that had been held since 1999. It was the only one of theWorld Golf Championships to have been contested using thematch play format. From 2016 until its final year in 2023, it was held at theAustin Country Club inAustin, Texas, United States.
Previous names includeWGC-Dell Match Play (2015),WGC-Cadillac Match Play (2014),WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship (2001–2013), andWGC-Andersen Consulting Match Play Championship (1999–2000). Before moving to Austin it had been hosted inArizona eight times,California eight times, andAustralia once. It is sanctioned and organized by theInternational Federation of PGA Tours and the prize money is official money on thePGA Tour, theEuropean Tour and theJapan Golf Tour.Tiger Woods has the record number of wins with three.[1][2] The winner receives aWedgwood trophy named the Walter Hagen Cup.[3]
Thematch play format fell out of favor in professional individual golf tournaments with the growth of television. The two major match play tournaments in the pre TV era were thePGA Championship, which converted tostroke play format in 1958,[4] and theBritish PGA Matchplay Championship which faced a slow decline after the introduction of theBritish PGA Championship in 1955 (which had a stroke play format), and eventually became defunct in 1979.[5] Match play became mainly associated with amateur tournaments, and team tournaments such as theRyder Cup.[6]
Despite not being popular with television companies, and often requiring more rounds to be played by a player than a stroke play event, the format was still respected as offering a different challenge than stroke play. At the end of the 1990s, there were two significant unofficial match play tournaments, the relatively newAndersen Consulting World Championship of Golf, which had a 32-man field with the finals played inArizona,[7] and the much olderWorld Match Play Championship, which had a field of 16 players or less and was played inEngland.[8]
When theWorld Golf Championships were formed in 1999, it was decided one of the events would be held in match play format, which meant the return of an official match play event on thePGA Tour and theEuropean Tour. The WGC-Andersen Consulting Match Play was in effect the successor of the Andersen Consulting World Championship of Golf, which was discontinued.[7] The World Match Play Championship in England continued, but lost prestige after the introduction of the WGC event, and eventually became defunct in 2014.[9] The format of the new WGC competition was a straight knock out tournament involving the top 64 players in theOfficial World Golf Ranking, with each match played over 18 holes, except the final which was played over 36 holes. The first two events were held in February 1999 and 2000 at theLa Costa Resort and Spa in southernCalifornia,[1] which had hosted theTournament of Champions event for the previous thirty seasons (1969–1998).
In 2001, the tournament sponsor was renamed, and the tournament followed suit, becoming known as the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship. The tournament was held in early January by the highly regardedMetropolitan Golf Club inMelbourne,Australia. Nearly forty players turned down their invitation, including six of the top ten. This was largely seen as because it was played very early in the year when some players have an off season, and for many players the travel time was too long when playing a single tournament where you could end up playing just a single round.[10] The following year the tournament returned toLa Costa Resort and Spa in SouthernCalifornia where it remained until 2006.[1]
In2007 and2008, it was played atThe Gallery Golf Club atDove Mountain inMarana, Arizona, and from 2009 to 2014 at the nearbyRitz-Carlton Golf Club (renamed as simply "The Golf Club at Dove Mountain" in 2013). Tiger Woods is the most successful player in the WGC Match Play, and he won his three titles in Arizona, although he was less dominant than he was in the other U.S.-basedWorld Golf Championship events.Geoff Ogilvy became the second most successful player in the tournament's history after winning in2006 and2009 and finishing runner up in2007. Despite normal highs of 69 °F (21 °C) in Marana in February, the tournament was delayed by snow/hailstones in2011, andsnow in2013.[11] Also in 2011, the format of the final was reduced to 18 holes instead of 36 holes, similar to the other rounds of the tournament.[12]
As well as the intermittent weather issues in Dove Mountain, the performance of the WGC Match Play was a concern for other reasons, with Rex Hoggard of theGolf Channel remarking "Since 2007, when the Tour uprooted the Match Play from La Costa for the Tucson highlands, the galleries have been thin, the golf courses have been tolerated and the Sundays have been largely undistinguished".[13] In 2015 the tournament underwent a revamp, moving toTPC Harding Park, a municipal course owned by the city and county ofSan Francisco, and became sponsored byCadillac (who also sponsored theWGC Championship). The tournament moved from February to April 27 – May 3, the week prior toThe Players Championship. The structure was changed so the field was split into 16 four-player groups played on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, with the player with the best record advancing. The four knockout rounds are then split over Saturday and Sunday. The format ensured that spectators could guarantee to see the entire field on the first three days, and some coverage would occur in primetime in theEast Coast of the United States.[14]
After one year in California, the tournament moved to March with a new long term home and sponsor, theAustin Country Club inTexas, andDell (which is headquartered in greater Austin area).[15] The following year, as a result of the title sponsor's involvement in a merger the tournament became known as the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play. In 2015,Jason Day became the third player to win multiple WGC Match Plays,[1] and in 2016Dustin Johnson won to become the only player to have won all fourWorld Golf Championships.[11] In early 2019, a deal was signed for Dell Technologies to remain the sponsor, and Austin Country Club the host, until at least 2023.[16] In March 2023, it was announced by thePGA Tour that the event would end following the 2023 edition.[17]
The tournament has a field of 64 players filled based upon the following criteria:
The tournament is split into two phases:
All matches are played over 18 holes.
Three players have won the tournament more than once:
The title has been successfully defended only once, by Woods in 2004.
37°43′30″N122°29′35″W / 37.725°N 122.493°W /37.725; -122.493
