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FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — The ropeline. That’s what separates us from them, them from us, and fantasy from reality. A flimsy string strung from post to post. That’s all it took to enable umpteen American fans Saturday to believe they could hurl all imaginable insults at Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry. And to believe they could do so without consequence. And to believe that, by doing so, they could end one of the all-time no-shows in American Ryder Cup history.
The line, to be clear, was crossed time and time again.
But somehow it held.
And in the end, all that the ropeline at Bethpage Black did Saturday was provide a view for how to win with beautiful defiance.
The Europeans’ current lead at the 2025 Ryder Cup — 11 1/2 to 4 1/2, and mere two and a half points needed in Sunday’s 12 singles matches to retain the cup — is not only insurmountable, it is, more to the point, a portrait of this European team’s ability to punch back.
Two full days of this. American momentum one minute, a European answer the next. American moxie one minute, European poise the next. American arrogance one minute, European resilience the next.
Presented with no tangible sign of life from Team USA on Saturday, seeing a six-point deficit to start stretch to eight by the end of morning foursome matches, many in the American crowd decided to dial things up in the afternoon. The early part of the day had already seen McIlroy back off a shot from the rough on No. 16, turn to some hecklers and yell, “Shut the f— up!” before hitting a 149-yard shot to 3 feet, 2 inches. That approach ended the match of McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood against Collin Morikawa and Harris English. Shrewdly, some fans decided to lean into the strategy.
McIlroy and Lowry teamed together against Justin Thomas and Cameron Young for afternoon fourball. The match began with the deejay blasting “Start Me Up” as the group left the first tee. “Beast of Burden” would’ve been more appropriate. Put me out, put me out, put me out of misery …
Rory McIlroy, left, and Tommy Fleetwood won both matches together this week. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)
The match began with typical Ryder Cup blather, but soon turned tense. Attempting a winning putt on the fourth hole — not strolling around and eying the line, but standing over the ball, ready to pull back the putter — McIlroy flinched when a voice barked: “F— you, Rory!” McIlroy backed away, drawing jeers, before Lowry came over to settle him. While McIlroy missed the eventual attempt, Lowry did not, ramming in a winner and turning to the crowd, pounding his chest and barking back.
Turns out, heckling doesn’t often work against older brothers, and if there’s anything McIlroy has reliably had in recent years, it’s Lowry as a one-man caravan.
The next few holes only turned worse, building from a steady din of insults to what felt might lead to an eventual dust-up. Nothing was off-limits. Petulant abuse was one thing. The searing comments about his personal life were another. They were relentless. They were over the line. Wives and families of the American players following the group traded uncomfortable looks. Lowry, meanwhile, reached a boil without ever turning on the gas. Every shot, every putt was followed with froth.
By the time the group reached No. 6, McIlroy felt he couldn’t putt because the crowd would not settle. Thomas, the most veteran U.S. Ryder Cupper, raised his hands, asking for some quiet.
With the match feeling ready to veer off the rails, European vice captain Edoardo Molinari and Mike Raby, the referee assigned to the match, were seen having lengthy discussions about how to retain order. In time, all varieties of uniforms — security officers, park police, state police, bike police — grew, lining every hole.
On the seventh hole, when a fan yelled, “Rory, you’re ugly!” as he stood over a putt, Lowry walked over, pointed him out to an officer, and the fan scurried away.
On the eighth, when a fan yelled, “F— you, Rory!” a New York State Police officer stopped, turned around and responded, “You can heckle if you want, but no need for that.”
By the time the group made the turn, Thomas was essentially acting as a one-man volume knob, pleading for the crowd to quiet down with McIlroy or Lowry ready to putt, then pointing to his ear for points delivered by himself or Young.
On the 14th, as a McIlroy birdie fell to break a tie and give him and Lowry a 1-up lead that they wouldn’t relinquish, Lowry thundered toward the crowd, slamming his chest and unloading some choice words. McIlroy walked off with a silent stare.
The Europeans, including Viktor Hovland, responded to every American effort in the necessary way on Saturday. (Jared C. Tilton / Getty Images)
By day’s end, when asked if the crowd went too far, McIlroy swallowed some nails and responded: “It’s not for me to say. People can be their own judge of whether they took it too far or not. I’m just proud of us for being able to win today with what we had to go through.”
It was another answer in this week’s long line of you-can-not-knock-us-off-our-game European responses.
Saturday began with Young, the would-be New York storybook, nearly holing an approach on No. 1 to detonate an early charge. The U.S. assumed a conceded birdie and a 1-up lead to jumpstart the day. Then Ludvig Åberg dropped an 11-foot birdie on top of Young to halve the hole.
When Morikawa and English went 1-up after the first hole, giving McIlroy and Fleetwood their first-ever deficit in four career matches together, the Euros responded by winning the next two holes, taking a lead, and never looking back.
Around mid-Saturday morning, when the broadcast suggested to viewers that the Americans might be gaining momentum, the camera next focused on Jon Rahm standing with his feet in a bunker, addressing a sidehill lie at knee-height. This match seemed ready to tilt to the U.S. That is, until Rahm chipped the ball, raised his hand as it landed and watched it roll into the back of the cup. Like that, a 1-up lead for Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton, one they’d hold until a 3&2 win.
When world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, trying desperately to turn a disastrous week around, followed a birdie on No. 11 by dropping a 214-yard approach to 20 inches for birdie, the shot was matched by a 36-foot birdie putt by Robert MacIntyre. Scheffler and partner Russell Henley moved along to what would end as a 3&2 defeat, while MacIntyre blew kisses at the crowd.
“Crowds have energy, and you can use it however you want,” European captain Luke Donald said. “It’s however you frame it. There’s a stimulus, a response, and in between that is how you decide what you want to do with it.”
This is how it’s happened. How Scheffler finds himself, somewhat impossibly, at 0-4-0 for the week. How fellow U.S. star Bryson DeChambeau found himself on a dark practice green late Saturday night. How a Sunday at Bethpage, with nearly 50,000 fans on the way, and millions of dollars spent on tickets, and two years of hype coming to a head, is now a complete afterthought.
That’s all the Americans are left with.
Because that’s the thing about defiance.
It’s hard to hold back.
(Top photo of Rory McIlroy, left, and Shane Lowry: Carl Recine / Getty Images)