ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – A fifth major championship was seemingly ordained for Rory McIlroy at the Home of Golf.
Cam Smith had other ideas.
The Aussie used a five-birdie stretch to start the final nine holes and capped it with an 18th-hole birdie to shoot 8-under-par 64 and win his first major championship.
“It just unreal. To win this and win it here, at St. Andrews, is pretty special,” Smith said, holding the Claret Jug.
The winner of the Players Championship earlier this year, Smith seemed to make putts from everywhere – and McIlroy didn’t.
The four-time major champion who was bidding for his first major title since the 2014 PGA, didn’t do much wrong – he made no bogeys and missed no greens.
But he simply could not get any putts to drop on a day when he needed to go lower than the 2-under-par 70 he shot. McIlroy did not have a one-putt green.
Clearly the crowd favorite in his final-group pairing with Norway’s Viktor Hovland, McIlroy’s only birdies came at the par-5 fifth hole and the par-4 10th. In both cases, he two-putted for birdie.
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“The galleries have been massive,’’ McIlroy said on Saturday about the enormity of the moment. “The ovations coming on the greens, with the big grandstands. Walking up 18 and that whole scene and trying to look for my parents and (wife) Erica and Poppy in the windows of the Rusacks, because I know what rooms we’re staying in.
“I think it’s appreciating the moment as well and appreciating the fact that it’s unbelievably cool to have a chance to win The Open at St. Andrews. It’s what dreams are made of. And I’m going to try to make a dream come true tomorrow.’’
It didn’t happen. McIlroy ended up third, two shots back.
McIlroy and Hovland began the final round at 16 under par and with a four-shot advantage over Cam Young and Smith. It seemed for a time it would simply be a duel between McIlroy and Hovland, who blinked first with a bogey at the fourth hole.
When McIlroy birdied the par-5 fifth, he had a two-shot advantage.
But McIlroy was not getting any putts to drop. While he played solid, there were no birdies forthcoming, except on the par-4 10th, where he drove the green and two-putted from 125 feet.
And that is when Smith got hot.
The Aussie who won the Players Championship in March went on a run. His birdie at the 11th cut the lead to one before McIlroy followed with his birdie at the 10th. Smith then made birdies at the 12th, 13th and 14th holes – where he two-putted from 80 feet. He had made five straight and gone a shot ahead of McIlroy.
The only mistake he made was a poor approach to the 17th green, the Road Hole. You can’t miss it left there, and Smith did – leaving himself virtually no shot. So he simply putted around the bunker, then made the 10-footer to save par.
A final birdie at the 18th sealed it.