If the final round of the 2025 Masters was going to be summed up in one word, it would surely be historic, with Rory McIlroy winning a green jacket, a fifth major and completing the career grand slam.
What happened between Rory McIlroy teeing off on the first hole on Sunday at The Masters and holing the putt in the playoff to beat Justin Rose proved to be one of the most enthralling and turbulent passages of play the game has surely ever seen.
McIlroy lost the lead within two holes, went four shots clear around the turn, played 13 and 14 in three over par, and made a bogey on the last hole to end up in a playoff with Rose.
It screamed of a player who was feeling the strain of carrying at least 11 years of history on his shoulders in arguably the biggest tournament in the game – and the only tournament which could give McIlroy the career grand slam.
Padraig Harrington suggests what Rory McIlroy did during the final round of The Masters which he has never seen before
But this is a different McIlroy. He won the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and The Players Championship without playing at his very best. It appeared that he had given himself all of the tools needed to triumph around Augusta National.
But that was not the only difference. Speaking on Indo Sport, Padraig Harrington suggested that he noticed something about McIlroy during the final round which he had never seen before.
“I’ve never seen Rory react to his shots the way he reacted yesterday. There was a lot of emotion; we’ve never seen Rory drop a club, I know it went close on 10, but he was shouting after his tee shot on five, you just don’t see that with Rory. But that was very human. That’s how everyone reacts,” he said.
“We just don’t see it with Rory that often because I’m sure he likes winning, and they’re big tournaments he’s winning, but they don’t mean as much as that one did. So all those other wins he’s had over the last 15 years where he has won everything over and over and over, they can pay as much lip service to he won this FedEx Cup or this Order of Merit, or that, and Rory’s stood there and smiled for the cameras, but they didn’t mean what winning The Masters meant to him. And that’s the difference. The emotion. How many times did he hit a shot and bend over and look down?
“I was surprised that he was that outwardly emotional. I’m delighted that he was, as in, as a golfer, I want him to be human, I don’t want him to be superhuman. I want him to feel the same things I feel. I want him to be as anxious and as nervous as I would be. We just don’t get to see that with Rory at a lot of events because he’s so much better, he feels so much better, he knows he’s going to win.”
How Rory McIlroy reacted to blowing a four shot lead at the 2011 Masters as he finally gets across the line
Weirdly, it has not been The Masters which has inflicted the most scars on McIlroy in recent years. He has suffered heartbreak in the US Open and The Open Championship since 2022. But Augusta National has not been a happy hunting ground for the 35-year-old.
He had previously had two good chances to win, including in 2011 when he had a four shot lead with one round to play.
And given the drama which took place on Sunday, it is fascinating to see how McIlroy reacted to that collapse 14 years ago.
“I’m very disappointed. You know, I was leading this golf tournament with nine holes to go, and I just unraveled. Hit a bad tee shot on 10, and then never, never really recovered. You know, it’s going to be hard to take for a few days, but I’ll get over it. I’m fine. A couple of pretty good friends were in a similar position to me last year in Dustin Johnson and Nick Watney,” he said.
“I knew it was going to be very tough for me out there today, and it was. I felt good that I hung in well for the first nine holes, and then as I said, just sort of lost my speed on the greens, lost my line, lost everything for just two, three holes, 10, 11, 12, and couldn’t really recover after that.”
Oddly, not having too many chances of winning The Masters over the years probably helped McIlroy a little when the perfect opportunity to get across the line finally presented itself.
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