Just Golf

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McIlroy Able to Look Back at Near Miss and Laugh

By KAREN CROUSE


MEDINAH, Ill. – As Rory McIlroy celebrated Europe’s Ryder Cup victory Sunday night, somebody draped a giant timepiece around his neck. He laughed, but it wasn’t funny earlier in the day when McIlroy nearly missed his tee time for his singles match against Keegan Bradley after confusing his time zones.

McIlroy thought he was starting at 12:25 p.m., but that was Eastern Standard Time, or 11:25 a.m. in Chicago, which is in the Central time zone. “I was just casually walking out of my hotel room and got a phone call saying, ‘You’ve got 25 minutes until you tee off,’” he said. “I’ve never been so worried driving to the golf course before.”

He was driven through heavy traffic to Medinah Country Club in an unmarked police car, lights flashing, by a state trooper, who will go down in history as the Bartman of golf. If not for his timely intervention, McIlroy would not have made it to the course on time and would have faced disqualification. Instead, he arrived with 10 minutes to spare and defeated Bradley, the Americans’ hottest player, 2 and 1.

It’s hard to overstate how dispiriting it would have been for the Europeans to lose a point because their world No. 1, McIlroy, failed to read his tee time correctly. “If I let down those 11 other boys and vice captains and captains this week, I would never forgive myself,” McIlroy said. “I’m just obviously happy to get the point and help the cause out a little bit today.”

McIlroy endured good-natured teasing from his teammates in the press conference after the closing ceremony. Lee Westwood made siren noises and Sergio García started to explain why he believed McIlroy had purposely pushed the time limit while the captain, José María Olazábal, shook his head.

Finally, McIlroy interjected and said: “In a way it wasn’t a bad thing because I didn’t have time to think about it, and I just went out and played, and I played probably the best I’ve played all week. I still would have liked to have gotten here sooner, but I delivered my point for the team, and that was the most important thing.”

McIlroy elicited laughter when he relayed snippets of his conversation with the state trooper.

“I was like, ‘Just get me there, get me there,’” he said, “He was like, ‘Do you have motion sickness?’ I’m like, ‘No, I don’t care, just get me to the first tee.’”

By the end of the day, American fans had reason to rue that ride that McIlroy received. It proved the first of many breaks that went the Europeans’ way on this fateful day.