After Scheffler helped McIlroy into his first green jacket, McIlroy said he looked forward to putting the jacket on himself in a year\u2019s time.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wasn\u2019t quite correct,\u201d said McIlroy, who was assisted on Sunday evening by Chairman Fred Ridley, not a solo effort. \u201cBut I did want to prove that last year wasn\u2019t a fluke.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though McIlroy hadn\u2019t competed since pulling out of the Arnold Palmer Invitational four weeks ago with a minor back issue, he believed that he entered this week\u2019s Masters not only with a clearer mind but more prepared than ever. He spent so much time at Augusta National in recent weeks that he joked it had become his home course. There were some days when he\u2019d drop his 5-year-old daughter, Poppy, at school, fly from Jupiter, Florida, to Augusta, play some holes and be back home in time for dinner.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n ‘Nature of what’s at stake’: McIlroy on why Masters creates turbulence <\/p>\n Rory McIlroy spoke to the media after repeating as champion at Augusta National. He said that the tournament has seen runaway winners over the years, but it always seems to be a very tight finish Sunday given what’s at stake.<\/p>\n Borrowing some wisdom from Nicklaus, McIlroy tried to simulate tournament rounds as best he could on those trips. It was, of course, impossible to replicate what transpired over these past few days.<\/p>\n For 48 hours, McIlroy looked unbeatable. Fred Couples said Friday afternoon as McIlroy was orchestrating a 7-under 65 to jump a whopping six strokes clear of the field, \u201cRory may never lose this thing again.\u201d McIlroy\u2019s pals Shane Lowry and Tyrrell Hatton were jokingly waving their metaphorical white flags when they saw McIlroy the next day in player dining. McIlroy responded by telling them, \u201cBoys, there\u2019s a long way to go.\u201d<\/p>\n Boy, was he right. McIlroy struggled with his ball-striking, particularly with a left miss, and came crashing back to the field with a Saturday 73 on a day when Augusta National played the easiest it ever had in a third round. Now tied with Cameron Young for the lead at 11 under, McIlroy put on a calm face in his post-round interview but then bolted straight to the tournament practice area, where he hit exactly 47 balls, most of them short-irons and wedges. By the time McIlroy stepped on the range Sunday morning, he\u2019d straightened himself out.<\/p>\n Young\u2019s Masters Sunday began like any other Lord\u2019s Day. He and his family \u2013 wife, Kelsey, and their children, Henry, John and Vivienne \u2013 attended Catholic mass at a nearby church. Seventy years ago, Jack Burke nearly missed his Masters tee time after the church service he was at started a half hour late. Burke arrived at Augusta National with just 15 minutes to warm up, though he then made up eight shots on overnight leader Ken Venturi to complete the largest comeback in tournament history and win his only green jacket.<\/p>\n While Young rolled down Magnolia Lane with plenty of time to spare, his major prayers would not be answered. He quieted the largely pro-McIlroy crowd early with a nifty pitch that barely cleared the right greenside bunker and ensuing birdie at the par-5 second to take his first lead. He then led by two shots after McIlroy shockingly three-putted from 9 feet at the par-3 fourth.<\/p>\n Young, who opened his week with a first-nine 40, displayed major-worthy ball-striking for much of the tournament and missed just one green on the second nine on Sunday. But with the putter, he could get nothing to fall.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you go through the back nine, I pretty much had a birdie chance on every hole and didn\u2019t make any,\u201d said Young, who had especially good looks on both par-5s, Nos. 13 and 15. \u201cThat\u2019s how it goes sometimes. \u2026 Any one of those, or three of them, could have gone in and be a different story.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead, McIlroy followed a familiar script. Nicklaus\u2019 recent piece of advice to McIlroy was, \u201cNo effing double bogeys,\u201d though McIlroy couldn\u2019t help himself. Last year, he doubled the first hole on Sunday; this time, that double came three holes later. He bogeyed the par-3 sixth, too, to return to single digits, right as Rose was mounting his charge. Rose capped his first-nine 32 with three straight birdies, seemingly headed toward a place in the record books; had he won, in his 21st career Masters start, it would\u2019ve been the longest wait for that first green jacket ever.<\/p>\n Unfortunately for the 45-year-old Englishman, he fell apart at Amen Corner with bogeys at Nos. 11 and 12 and eventually signed for 70, ending in a four-way tie for third at 10 under.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like with a sudden-death loss, you kind of know you got to the house, you\u2019ve done everything it took to win, then it comes down to flick of a coin at times,\u201d Rose said. \u201cWhereas today, I felt like, yeah, there was an opportunity to do better, so obviously that is frustrating.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n The players who have prevailed at the Masters Tournament, from 1934-2025, and their winning scores.<\/p>\n McIlroy stayed in the game with birdies at Nos. 7 and 8, but as he turned for home on Sunday afternoon, the winds began to gust harder than they had in days. The breeze was a nice reprieve from the warm temps, but it also meant that McIlroy, already feeling a sense of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu, would face heightened difficulty on a second nine where he carded just two pars and shot 2 over in last year\u2019s final round. If McIlroy repeated history, an overall repeat would be highly unlikely, which would\u2019ve been, McIlroy admitted later, a \u201cbitter pill to swallow\u201d considering the earlier cushion.<\/p>\n But McIlroy was much more controlled this time. Maybe he was right about the green jacket\u2019s medicinal benefits. McIlroy\u2019s mantra all week was to just keep swinging, and his best swing came where Masters are usually lost, at the par-3 12th, also known as Golden Bell, which played 161 yards with the wind back and off the left, though also swirling.<\/p>\n McIlroy had just regained the solo lead as he waited to hit his tee shot, a perfect, three-quarter 9-iron. With the wind suddenly feeling as if it\u2019d changed direction, McIlroy paused longer, thinking back to his very first Masters practice round, in 2009, when Tom Watson told him to wait to hit until the wind is where it should be, then hit the shot as soon as you can. When the wind was just right, McIlroy aimed at the middle of the bunker and watched his tee ball cut right, farther right than anticipated, before it landed on the green and kicked toward the hole to 7 feet.<\/p>\n The ensuing roar rocked Augusta National the hardest it\u2019d been rocked all week. Out of sight, a young boy heard the noise and asked his dad, who was likely trying to beat traffic, \u201cWas that for Cam?\u201d The father replied, \u201cNo, that\u2019s Rory. Too loud.\u201d (Young would give himself a 14-foot look at birdie on the hole, but he missed the putt.)<\/p>\n \u201cThat was a really good golf shot at the right time,\u201d McIlroy said, \u201cand probably a golf shot I wouldn\u2019t have been able to hit yesterday if I didn\u2019t 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.\u201d<\/p>\n McIlroy hit the fairway on the par-5 13th hole for the first time since Tuesday\u2019s practice round, then added his final birdie of the tournament to stretch his lead to three shots. Scheffler cut the gap to two with back-to-back birdies, at Nos. 15 and 16, but he\u2019d settle for a closing 68, 11-under week and his third career runner-up in a major.<\/p>\n Still at 13 under after a clutch Texas wedge from behind the 16th green to save par, McIlroy told himself on the par-4 17th tee box, \u201cI just need four more good swings.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI made one,\u201d McIlroy added with a laugh.<\/p>\n None was worse than McIlroy\u2019s final tee ball, a 266-yard slice into the trees.<\/p>\n \u201cWalking off the 18th tee, not knowing where my ball was; I think that was the moment of greatest stress,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cIt could go anywhere. It could be anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n But when McIlroy arrived at his ball, sitting in the pine straw, he had a window. From 179 yards out, he cooked a big draw \u2013 like the one he struck on the 15th hole a year ago \u2013 around the pines, over the scoreboard and into the left greenside bunker. He then blasted out to 12 feet and with a shot to work with, missed his par putt by a couple inches.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1776063368_321_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1776063369_346_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Jack](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1776063369_431_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n