SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — When Rory McIlroy rattled off three straight birdies of 66 ft on Saturday, he seemed poised to take an enormous leap on the U.S. Open.
The magic shortly disappeared. And when his depressing again 9 ended, so did McIlroy.
The Masters champion hit 5 bogeys, shot a 40, and completed with a 3-over 73, severely hurting his probabilities of profitable, if not utterly ending it.
Birdies on Nos. 5 via 7 — the primary time he is had three birdies in a row on the U.S. Open since profitable the primary spherical in 2011 — sparked a stretch that noticed him climb to a front-side 33, which at one level was within the prime 10, earlier than utterly collapsing.
McIlroy left Sinek Hills shortly after his spherical, declining interview requests and weaving his means via the throng of followers to his automotive.
Even after making three consecutive bogeys within the second spherical on Friday, he felt he might nonetheless be within the event and believed he might transfer up within the standings by avoiding these errors.
“I simply tried to make fewer errors this weekend and really feel like I am taking part in nicely sufficient to get a birdie right here and there,” he stated.
There have been too many errors and too few birdies on Saturday.
McIlroy opened the event with a 69 however struggled to seek out Shinnecock’s second 9 over the following two rounds, and Saturday’s upset began within the good spot.
He was on the tenth fairway, 49 yards to the opening, when his second shot bounced on the inexperienced however rolled large. It was the second day in a row that he missed the tenth gap from inside 100 yards of the golf green.
McIlroy added one other bogey on the twelfth. He bogeyed the tenth and twelfth holes on Friday, however birdied the following two holes to get his spherical again on observe.
It isn’t Saturday. He made bogeys on the 14th and fifteenth, and added the final one on the 18th.
This places him at 3 over for the event, 10 strokes behind Windham Clark.
