Five overlooked stories from Tiger’s historic Masters win

AUGUSTA, Ga. – Five things you may have missed amid the history-making excitement of Tiger Woods’ fifth Masters Tournament, 15th major, and 81st PGA TOUR victory. 1. The Masters juju was in full effect. When Woods won his historic first Masters title, in 1997, he played alongside Costantino Rocca in the final round. Rocca was arguably golf’s most prominent Italian touring professional until—Francesco Molinari, with whom Woods played in winning his fifth Masters on Sunday. While that was probably just a coincidence, nowhere is the Masters juju in greater effect than at the 12th hole, and once again there were strange, spooky happenings there. How could not one but four players in the last two threesomes find Rae’s Creek at the shortest par 3 on the course? Answer: the famous swirling winds at pretty-but-deadly Golden Bell.  “I played exactly how I wanted to play,â€� said Brooks Koepka, one of those who found the creek and double-bogeyed the hole on the way to a final-round 70 to finish 12 under, a shot back and in a three-way tie for second. “Didn’t really miss too many shots. Even the one on 12, I hit it exactly where I wanted to and the wind can kind of make you look stupid on that hole.â€� After ranking no harder than the 10th most difficult hole the first three days, the 12th was the hardest hole Sunday, with nine double bogeys and a 3.385 stroke average. 2. Woods hit the big shots in the clutch, but he got away with some. We can debate about whether or not this was the greatest comeback in sports history, but not whether, as usual, the win required a little luck. Because while Woods managed his game better than anyone and hit several terrific shots, he admitted he got away with some clunkers. “The tee shot at 11 was awful,â€� he said. He was talking about Sunday, but could have just as easily been talking about Saturday. Both times, though, he was far enough right to get lucky and be afforded a clear shot at the green—albeit a frighteningly narrow gap in the trees in the final round. (You couldn’t have drawn it any better with the ShotTracer.) Also, Woods got away with a left miss off the tee at the par-5 13th hole Saturday, his ball kicking out of the trees and into a playable spot in the grass. Golf is about not just great shots but also managing your misses, and with a little luck, Woods did that. Like many others, he never really figured out how to play the newly-lengthened, par-4 fifth hole, making bogey each day, but cited his 22 Masters starts as helping him get across the finish line. “It helps to be experienced,â€� he said, speaking of the devilish 12th hole, where everything changed. “That’s all I was concentrating on. Don’t be fooled. The other guys ended up short.â€� 3. It was age before beauty, but the kids are alright. Woods joked about the stress of trying to win causing his hair loss, but the reality is he was hardly the first person with male pattern baldness to slip on the green jacket. He was the second oldest Masters champion after Jack Nicklaus (46 in ’86) and the seventh player in his 40s to win. The others: Ben Crenshaw (43 in ’95), Gary Player (42 in ’78), Sam Snead (41 in ’54), Mark O’Meara (41 in ’98), and Ben Hogan (40 in ’53). What’s more, Woods broke the record of years between Masters victories (14, ’05-2019), previously held by Player (’61-’74). Bernhard Langer, 61, made the cut. Still, the kids and newcomers acquitted themselves well. Four amateurs made the cut, led by Oklahoma State’s Victor Hovland, who shot 72-71-71-71 to finish T32 and win low amateur. Meanwhile, newcomer Justin Harding of South Africa, a relatively unknown Presidents Cup hopeful, birdied the last hole to tie for 12th, which means he gets to come back next year. And while Xander Schauffele (68, T2) didn’t succeed in becoming the fifth straight first-time major winner at Augusta (Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia, Danny Willett, Jordan Spieth), he led the field with 25 birdies and looks like a big-game hunter. Of course, we already knew that about Koepka, who has three victories and a T2 in his last eight majors. He also has made 19 consecutive cuts in the majors after missing his first two, at the 2012 U.S. Open and 2013 Open Championship. This marked his second T2 of this season (The Honda Classic), which he began by winning THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES.    4. Bryson’s ace was nearly a bookend, and he called it. In the course of shooting an opening-round 66, Bryson DeChambeau (70, T29) came within inches of making a hole-in-one on 16. He spoke afterward of never having made an ace. His disappointment lasted all of three days, though, because DeChambeau made one of two aces at 16 on Sunday, the other authored by Justin Thomas. “I knew back three years ago,â€� DeChambeau said after the final round, which he began with double-bogeys on 10 and 11. “I said to my caddie and to everyone in my camp, it was like, ‘I’m going to make a hole-in-one here one day, and sure enough it was my first one three years later.â€� 5. McIlroy and Spieth saw silver linings at T21 Jordan Spieth shot a front-nine 40 and an opening-round 75, but rallied with scores of 68-69-71. Not particularly memorable for a guy who won the tournament in 2015 and was in the mix to do the same in ’16 (T2) and ’18 (solo third), but Spieth is trying to crawl out of a long slump. “Positives,â€� he said, when asked what he took from the week. “I’m proud of kind of the progress I made, sticking to kind of the process,â€� he continued. “And I felt like I got to a position today that’s felt better than it’s been, tee to green, and even on the greens, in quite a while. So I’m just going to stick with it and hopefully get off to a little better start (at the RBC Heritage) next week, keep the consistency and have a chance to win.â€� Meanwhile, McIlroy, who won THE PLAYERS Championship last month and was going for the career Grand Slam at Augusta National, said he wasn’t far off but faulted his play on the par 4s. “And that’s just putting myself out of position off the tee,â€� he said after going 7 over on the par-4 holes for the week. “And then once you get yourself out of position it’s very hard to put yourself back in position. You miss greens, trying to get it up and down, you put pressure on yourself.  “So my driving accuracy wasn’t quite as good this week as it has been the last few weeks,â€� he added. “And that was probably the main reason why I didn’t contend this week.â€�

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