Garcia finally wins his major crown
Spaniard beats England’s Rose in gripping playoff to capture Masters title and conquer demons
AUGUSTA, GA. — In Europe, the man who popularized golf was Spaniard Seve Ballesteros, who was Arnold Palmer with an accent. Like Palmer, Ballesteros was very, very good when he hit his drives straight and even better if they went crooked.
In 1980, three months after Sergio Garcia was born, Ballesteros won the first of his two Masters titles. Garcia grew up idolizing the swashbuckling Ballesteros, whose influence on Garcia was immense.
Nearly six years after Ballesteros died of brain cancer, on what would have been his 60th birthday, Garcia conquered the field, Augusta National and his demons — not necessarily in that order — to win the Masters.
Garcia weathered the challenge of his playing partner Justin Rose and potential calamity on the back nine to claim his longawaited first major title.
After starting the round tied with Rose at 6-under-par, Garcia built a three-shot lead early, lost it, fell behind Rose by two after 11 holes, missed a short putt at the 18th hole to win and then claimed the green jacket with a birdie on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff.
Garcia and Rose finished 72 holes at 9-under-par 279.
This was Garcia’s 74th start at a major. That it took him so long to win one would have been hard to conceive in 1999, when Garcia burst onto the scene as a teenager with a runner-up finish to Tiger Woods at the PGA Championship.
After his third straight below-par round Saturday, Garcia said it had been hard, “but it was fun.” That was a marked departure for Garcia, who five years earlier had walked off Augusta National’s 18th green after his third round and said he was not good enough to win a major because he lacked “the thing I need to have.”
From then to now, Garcia gained a few more years of maturity, and a fiancée. In three months, he will be married to Angela Akins, who played golf at Texas Christian and met Garcia when she was working at Golf Channel.
Akins’ sunny personality can lift Garcia’s dark moods, and her father, Marty, a former National Football League quarterback, has been an optimistic voice to cut through Garcia’s negative self-talk.
“Marty is a very, very positive — you know — outspoken and very, very confident kind of guy,” Garcia said, “and it definitely helps when he’s encouraging you and things like that.”
Garcia had to give himself a pep talk after Rose, on the strength of three consecutive birdies starting at the sixth, drew even. After they both made the turn in 2under 34, Garcia gave up the lead with a bogey on the par-4 10th, where convention holds that the Masters officially begins.
Garcia bogeyed No. 11 as well, falling two shots back, and then his tee shot on the 13th hole ended up under an azalea bush. But he managed to save par, and Rose just missed a birdie putt, keeping Garcia in striking distance.
A birdie on the 14th got Garcia one shot closer. At No. 15, he hit a stunning second shot to within 15 feet of the hole, then made his eagle putt. After a Rose birdie, the two were tied again, at 9-under.
Rose birdied the 16th but gave back the lead with a bogey at the 17th so that the final group arrived at the 18th tee tied at 9-under. Both men missed birdie putts, sending the tournament to a sudden-death playoff.
The playoff started at the 18th, where Rose’s tee shot landed in mulch off the fairway. He ended up with a bogey, giving Garcia two putts from 10 feet to win the Masters. He needed only one.
Charl Schwartzel, the 2011 champion here, shot a final-round 68 to finish alone in third at 6-under.
Rickie Fowler, who was also seeking his first major title, started the day one shot back, but he could not make a move after an erratic round with seven bogeys and three birdies. A 76 left him at 1-under.
Jordan Spieth, who won in 2015 but squandered a big final-round lead on the back nine last year, was only two shots behind the leaders when play began Sunday. But he did not wait for the back nine to falter this time. He bogeyed three of his first six holes and made the turn six shots out of the lead. And it only got worse. Two bogeys and a double bogey followed before Spieth birdied the three of his last four holes to finish at 1-under. Matt Kuchar did make a charge, including a hole in one at the 16th that left him 5-under. But Kuchar ran out of chances to get closer. Joining Kuchar at 5-under was Thomas Pieters, a 25-year-old Belgian playing his first Masters.