Rory McIlroy hits out of the bunker on the 12th hole during the second round of the PGA Championship golf tournament at Valhalla Golf Club on Friday.
Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus next for streaking McIlroy
AUGUST 17, 2014, 11:38 PM LAST UPDATED: SUNDAY, AUGUST 17, 2014, 11:52 PM
BY TARA SULLIVAN
RECORD COLUMNIST
THE RECORD
The scenes from the final round of golf’s final major won’t soon be forgotten. Against a perilously setting sun, some of the world’s best players dueled atop a rapidly changing leader board, waging a battle rife with drama and thick with tension, fueled by fantastic shots and heart-stopping mistakes.
It was a PGA Championship that brought us so much, culminating in a second straight major win for Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland.
And yet, the tournament was as remarkable for what it didn’t have as what it did.
No Tiger Woods in the final round? No problem.
Woods has not been a factor this golf season, his advancing age and balky back keeping him out of action for months and putting him on the wrong side of the cut line when he rushed into action at the PGA. The doubts grow ever stronger that Woods will conquer his stated career goal of surpassing Jack Nicklaus’ 18 major titles (Woods has 14), and the most famous player of his generation won’t even participate this week in The Barclays, the first step in the season-ending FedEx Cup.
But Rory will. The world’s No. 1 player is bringing his surging game and meteoric profile to Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus. For a sport in need of new faces, McIlroy is making his case as the first Woods replacement in years. He won’t ever match Woods’ mass appeal and crossover popularity, but for the golf purist and traditional fan, he’s a very welcome sight.
The way McIlroy won at Valhalla in Louisville, Ky., the way he carried his lead into Sunday morning, lost it across a middling front nine and roared back to win, was, well, Tiger-esque.
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