3,899 days had passed since Rory McIlroy last lifted a major championship trophy. Nearly 11 years of close calls, public scrutiny and quietly destructive mental torment. Years in which McIlroy carried the burden, as he described it, “not just for not being able to win another major, but for not being able to complete the Grand Slam.”
Before Sunday.
A day that began with sports commentator Jim Nantz’s familiar “Hello, friends” and ended with what will surely go down as one of the most iconic calls in sports history: “The long journey is over … McIlroy has his masterpiece.”
Sunday seemed to encapsulate McIlroy’s entire career in a single round of golf. The soaring highs, the crushing lows. Brilliant shots followed by bewildering mistakes. Moments of controversy and unrelenting competition. But this time, McIlroy got it done, edging out his European counterpart, Justin Rose, in a playoff victory — the first at the Masters Tournament since 2017, where Rose also found himself on the losing end.
The 44-year-old Justin Rose put up a gutsy performance of his own in pursuit of his first Masters victory. The Englishman came out firing on all cylinders in the first two rounds, carding a 65 (-7) and 71 (-1) to position himself atop the leaderboard heading into the weekend. But a third-round 75 (+3) on Saturday lagged behind a surging Rory McIlroy, seemingly removing Rose from serious contention.
However, early heroics on Sunday told a different story. While McIlroy got off to a nervy start, Rose caught fire, rattling off seven birdies in his first 13 holes to vault back into the conversation.
Much like Rose, 25-year-old Ludvig Åberg came out strong, inching closer to McIlroy with each hole. The stoic Åberg had been touted by pundits as a pre-tournament favorite, and for much of Sunday, he was living up to the hype.
“There’s an old saying that the real Masters doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday.” But with Rory McIlroy separating himself from the field as he turned to Augusta National Golf Club’s final stretch, the truth of that phrase seemed in doubt.
Birdie on 10. Cheers roared across the property. How could he lose it now?
At one point, McIlroy held a four-shot lead as he approached Augusta National’s famed “Amen Corner.” But the three-hole stretch that has shaped so many Masters outcomes through history struck again.
McIlroy played holes 11, 12 and 13 in +3. Walking off the 13th green in disbelief, his lead had vanished. The narrative shifted from “How could he lose it?” to “He’s done it again.”
But something felt different. McIlroy was making mistakes, yes, but his attitude, his posture and that familiar glare never wavered.
Striding up the 15th fairway, now trailing Rose by one and tied with Åberg, McIlroy faced a moment that would define the tournament. After watching his playing partner Bryson DeChambeau dunk his approach into Rae’s Creek, McIlroy took one more club and pulled a 7-iron. What followed will surely be remembered as one of the greatest shots in Masters history. Shaping it around Augusta National’s towering magnolias, he landed the ball just past the creek. It rolled perfectly to the back hole location and set up a critical birdie that vaulted him ahead of both Åberg and Rose.
While a couple of late misses on the greens ended Åberg’s hopes of a first major title, a dropped shot by McIlroy on the 17th gave Rose yet another opening. On his final hole, Rose drained a dramatic 20-foot putt, punctuated by a resounding shout and a fist pump, to tie McIlroy and force a playoff.
Two perfectly played holes set the stage for a duel on the 18th green with the green jacket on the line. As Rose’s birdie putt slid just past the hole, all eyes turned to McIlroy. Having missed a short putt on the same green in regulation, this putt was all but a formality.
Silence swept across Augusta as McIlroy stood over the ball, carrying the weight of a decade’s worth of expectation on his putter. When it dropped, he fell to his knees in tears. His roar as he rose wasn’t just victory … it was triumph over the battles he’d long fought within himself: “I’ve dreamt about that moment for as long as I can remember,” he later said.
With the win, McIlroy becomes just the sixth player in history to complete the career grand slam, having now claimed all four of golf’s major championships. The burden is finally gone. In its place, renewed belief and freedom to achieve even greater lengths in the sport.
“They’re going to have to wheel me out of here until I’m 90 years old.”
The end of one journey? Maybe. The end of his journey? Most certainly not.