With the Masters starting Thursday, the eyes of history fall on Tiger and Rory

The groupings sheet was released promptly at noon on Tuesday, and two names stacked in the middle leaped off the page.

11:04 a.m. Tiger Woods.

11:15 a.m. Rory McIlroy.

Back-to-back in the marquee window Thursday. Back-to-back in the last two groups off the tee Friday. Will they be side-by-side chasing history on Sunday afternoon?

Three-time champion-turned-TV analyst Nick Faldo said he has 20 names on his list of potential winners in the 2019 Masters Tournament, but he only mentioned two of them.

“If Rory wins, grand slam, that’s fantastic,” Faldo said. “If Tiger wins, my goodness what’s that story going to be? It might make the morning papers – for the next three months.”

For two generational icons separated by 13 1/2 years in age, Woods and McIlroy have turned into the closest thing to a rivalry these days in golf. Three times since Woods returned from his injury layoff last season they’ve been sent out together in marquee early pairings, including the first two rounds of the 2018 PGA Championship.

Three more times they’ve encountered each other on the business end of the tournament, including the final round of the Tour Championship last season where Woods won for the first time in five years, and during the knockout round of WGC Match Play two weeks ago where Woods eliminated McIlroy.

This week they are the two biggest stories with bigger stakes: McIlroy still chasing the last piece of his career major on the course where he came so painfully close to winning his first. Woods trying to cap his comeback and kickstart his quest to catch Jack Nicklaus’ six green jackets and 18 majors.

What would it mean for them to share the biggest stage in golf with history on the line Sunday?

“I guess the cliché answer is it would mean a lot to me, but it doesn’t matter who it is,” McIlroy said. “You know, what other people do, it’s none of my business. I have to look after myself and control what I do, and, you know, that’s all I really have to focus on.”

McIlroy will make his fourth run at completing the career slam with a chance to add the green jacket to his four major wins in the U.S. Open, British Open and PGA (twice). He’s finished in the top 10 at Augusta five consecutive years, last year falling short despite playing Sunday in the final pairing with eventual winner Patrick Reed.

He returns this year with a red-hot game (top-10 finishes in all seven PGA Tour starts this season including a win at the Players Championship) and a more zen-like attitude he calls “the three P’s” – perspective, persistence and poise.

“I think I’ve found a formula that works for me, and I’m going to persist with it and I’m going to stick to it,” he said. “It’s helped me play some of the best golf of my career so far this year, and you know, hopefully that will continue.”

Woods long ago had the formula when he won 14 majors in 12 years. Beset by a series of back injuries and off-course traumas, he hasn’t won a major since 2008 or a Masters since 2005.

“I would say that I wouldn’t have foreseen that, for sure,” he said of the drought that forestalled his pursuit of Nicklaus’ records. “ After I won my 14th, I felt like I still had plenty more major championships that I could win, but unfortunately I just didn’t do it. I put myself there with chances on the back nine on various Sundays and just haven’t done it.”

Two of those chances came in his last two major starts where he held the lead with eight to play in the British Open and posted 64 in the final round of the PGA Championship to finish runner-up.

“I’ve worked my way back into one of the players that can win events,” Woods said. “I’ve proven that I can do it, and I put myself there with a chance to win the last two major championships of the year last year.”

Does he need to win another major to prove anything else?

“I don’t really need to win again – but I really want to,” Woods said with a smile.

Currently No. 12 in the world after returning to action 16 months ago ranked 1,199, Woods is the highest ranked former Masters champion in the field this week. For the first time since the Official World Golf Rankings began prior to the 1986 Masters, not a single top-10 player arriving at Augusta is already in possession of a green jacket.

It’s quite and accomplished group with a combined 11 majors, 65 PGA Tour wins, 114 global victories, two Players championships, a Tour Championship and an Olympic gold medal among them. But the Masters has so far eluded them all in a combined 58 Augusta starts.

That group includes rotating world No. 1’s Justin Rose and Dustin Johnson, reigning British Open champ Francesco Molinari, Quail Hollow PGA champion Justin Thomas and last year’s Masters runner-up Rickie Fowler.

“If you look at the skill sets of the guys at the top of the world rankings, Augusta really should suit most of us, to be honest with you,” said Rose, twice a runner-up, including a 2017 playoff with Sergio Garcia. “So I would say that this year there’s probably a very good probability that one of those guys will get it done.”

Also among them is Brooks Koepka, who has collected three majors since his last Masters appearance in 2017. He missed Augusta last year recovering from a wrist injury but came back to repeat as U.S. Open champion and win the PGA Championship.

“It was a blessing in disguise,” Koepka said of his absence last April. “I’ve said it a million times. I think that was something I needed, to really kind of find my love for the game again. … And then to come back and to have the year I had was impressive because I don’t think anybody saw that one coming.”

The beauty of the Masters is we’re never quite sure what kind of magic is coming. Whatever story emerges come Sunday, it will be historic.

“There’s plenty,” said Faldo. “Let it unfold and let’s see what happens.”

Masters on TV

This story was originally published April 9, 2019 at 6:27 PM.