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CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA | With a noisy gallery chanting his name as a warm Sunday afternoon breeze blew across the Quail Hollow Club, Rory McIlroy pushed his cap back, leaned his face toward the sky and closed his eyes.
After 553 days without a victory, a global pandemic, becoming a father for the first time, an internal battle with himself, a sudden neck issue hours before his first round here and too many questions about why he had fallen from first to 15th in the world rankings in less than a year, it seemed as though McIlroy had done more than win the Wells Fargo Championship for the third time.
The “Rory, Rory, Rory” chant had to sound like an angels’ choir to McIlroy, who celebrated his 32nd birthday here on Tuesday before the tournament began. More than any event since the PGA Tour restarted last June, the Wells Fargo Championship looked, felt and sounded like what now feels like the old days and McIlroy played his part.
Among the things that have gone missing in the past 14 months was McIlroy’s magnetic success. Tiger Woods aside, McIlroy is like no one else in golf.
That’s why his victory Sunday – stretched to gut-churning level when a poor tee shot on the 72nd hole cost him a penalty stroke and gave temporary life to eventual runner-up Abraham Ancer – resonated more than most.
“There’s been a lot of hard work,” McIlroy said. “I’ve put my head down, I haven’t really looked too much in either direction, I’ve just tried to do what I need to do.
“For a couple of months there, all that hard work seemed like it was not really getting anywhere, wasn't providing me with much but it’s such a funny week thinking that – knowing that my game was pretty good coming in here and then have my neck completely lock up on me on the range on Wednesday afternoon, not even thinking I was going to play on Thursday, and then I’m sitting here on Sunday night with a trophy.”
For a player who can make golf a beautiful game, this one was like road work on Sunday when the wind was blowing for the third consecutive day and McIlroy found himself three strokes back when he reached the second tee in the final round.
McIlroy played with a simple intention: Hit as many good shots as he could.
“I think when you haven’t been in contention for a while, it never feels normal,” McIlroy said. “I certainly felt it there on the back nine.
“There were some tee shots and some shots I just had to stand up and really commit to what I was doing. That’s sort of been my mantra – just hit good golf shots until I run out of holes and that’s basically what I tried to do the entire day, just take good shot after good shot until you get to the end.”
“There’s so much more I want to achieve and so much more I want to do in the game. But this is nice validation that I’m on the right track.”
Rory McIlroy
He wasn’t perfect. The new reliance on a fade off the tee after a lifetime of hitting powerful draws remains an unsettled work in progress. Still, McIlroy put on a professional demonstration of how to win a tournament, something playing partner Keith Mitchell appreciated.
“Shows you how awesome he is as a player because he didn’t have his best today and he still won and that’s why he's got majors and a bunch of wins,” said Mitchell, who tied for third. “It’s impressive watching that because he had to fight there today. ”
This was the first true test since McIlroy began working with instructor Pete Cowen and, as easy as McIlroy once made winning appear to be, it’s never easy. Especially now.
After shooting 66 on Friday morning before the wind fully arrived, McIlroy jokingly raised both arms above his head during an interview to celebrate playing his first weekend since March. His three previous starts had been a missed cut in the Players Championship, an early exit at the WGC-Dell Match Play Championship and a missed cut at the Masters.
McIlroy was even asked how he’d been spending his unplanned weekends off. A trip to the Bahamas. A dinner at Seminole with U.S. Walker Cup captain Nathanial Crosby. Time with wife Erica and daughter Poppy, who were on hand Sunday to celebrate their first Mother’s Day together.
“For it to be Erica's first Mother’s Day and for her to be here with Poppy, really, really cool,” McIlroy said. “It was hard for me not to think of that coming down the last few holes and how cool that would be to see them at the back of the 18th green, but I had more pressing issues at the time, so it was pretty easy to get it out of my head.”
McIlroy almost didn’t make it to the first tee Thursday. Near the end of a good practice session Wednesday, he flushed a 3-iron and as he turned to his caddie, Harry Diamond, the left side of McIlroy’s neck locked up. It had never happened before and he doesn’t know what caused it this time.
Had he drawn a Thursday morning tee time, McIlroy probably would have withdrawn because he still couldn’t make a full swing. He eventually loosened up, scratched out a 1-over-par 72 and now has three wins at a club that has made him a member.
Two strokes ahead with two holes remaining, McIlroy hit his best shot and his most important shot coming in. The best shot was a gorgeous, towering 7-iron just right of the hole on the watery par-3 17th hole, setting up a par that sent him to the 18th tee two ahead.
His pulled tee shot wound up on the grassy creek bank along the left side of the 18th fairway and he had a decision to make. To play a wedge shot from an awkward stance and a bad lie with the risk of compounding his trouble or accept a penalty stroke and give himself a better option of getting his third shot on the green.
Before McIlroy could take a hack with his wedge, Diamond talked him into minimizing the damage. He hit his third shot 44 feet right of the hole and two putted for his 19th PGA Tour victory.
“It’s tough to get over the line, especially if you haven’t done it in a while,” McIlroy said. “I made it hard for myself.”
A week ago, McIlroy was being asked why he hadn’t won since late 2019. Now he’s a week from returning to the Ocean Course at Kiawah Island to play the PGA Championship that he won there by a record eight shots in 2014.
Asked if he felt more relief or satisfaction Sunday evening, McIlroy said it was a combination of both. He will poke holes in what he did wrong but it felt like old times at Quail Hollow in so many ways.
“It’s satisfying to see the work is paying off, but it’s just the start,” McIlroy said. “There’s so much more I want to achieve and so much more I want to do in the game. But this is nice validation that I’m on the right track.”
The sound of it could be heard blowing in the wind late Sunday afternoon.
Top: Rory McIlroy got to celebrate the first Mother's Day for his wife, Erica, and their daughter, Poppy, by collecting another trophy.
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