When Rory McIlroy reached the world number one ranking in February of 2012 and became just the third player (Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus) to win four majors before the age of 25 in 2014 it was widely believed that he was destined for many back nine battles with Tiger Woods in major championships.
It never panned out that way, with a right spanking at the hands of Woods at the 2018 TOUR Championship at East Lake being the only major Sunday showdown between the pair.
Still, McIlroy and Tiger went head to head on Monday night at the TGL, a format which will make Tiger a much more consistent presence on our television screens than he has been at regular golf tournaments since 2021.
It wasn’t the major championship battle that we had anticipated for just over a decade but it was a thrilling spectacle and one that the TGL badly needed after three underwhelming editions.
The founders of the competition stepped up when needed.
McIlroy and Woods had their own matchplay moment on the 13th hole in the singles section of the contest as they both traded par putts to tie the hole, with Woods saving his side two points as McIlroy’s Boston Common side threw down the hammer to the 15-time major champion who rolled back the years in response.
“He’d missed a few early on. He’s getting a little older. His eyes might have been going. He struggles in this light. I thought it was a good opportunity if he missed to get two points when I think we had went one behind at that point,” said McIlroy afterwards.
“He just knocked it in the left side. It wasn’t like it was a dead center putt. But no, he stepped up and delivered like he usually does. It was a great match all night, back and forth, and exactly what the league needed.”
When Tiger does play in events he is usually lingering on or below the cut line as he struggles through 36 holes, but in this indoor simulator format, the 49-year-old can be competitive and McIlroy believes that Tiger still moves the needle, even indoors.
“Yeah, it’s amazing. I don’t think anyone can underestimate the impact that he’s had on our game and the impact that he’s had on all of us as professional golfers. Would TGL exist if Tiger wasn’t around for 20 years? Probably not.
“It’s amazing to go up and to compete against one of your heroes. I’ve shared the course with him many times, and I’ve been in a couple of final groups with him, and he has just as much intensity out there tonight as he does when he’s trying to win a major championship or trying to finish off a golf tournament.
“He was feeling it out there, and it was really cool to see.”
It feels like the TGL finally had lift off on Monday after three one sided contests.
This match went beyond the wire and a closest to the pin contest was needed to decide the winner with Tom Kim and Kevin Kisner coming up trumps for Tiger and Jupiter Links to take the victory.
McIlroy reinforced that while the players do want to make the competition as competitive as possible, he can’t guarantee that every contest will be a closely fought affair.
“Yeah, I think the nature of competition is you’re going to have some matches that are blowouts and you’re going to have some matches that are really tight. I think it was really cool that tonight was one of those matches that was really tight. I think the people in the arena seemed to enjoy it, and hopefully the people at home seemed to enjoy it, too.
“But that doesn’t mean that there’s going to be other matches that mightn’t be as close. It certainly helps from an entertainment perspective to have it that night, but that’s something that we can’t guarantee. This is competition, as well, at the end of the day, and we’re all trying to beat each other as best as we can.”
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