As he walked from the ninth green to the 10th tee Sunday afternoon, Jordan Spieth seemed on his way to a second straight wire-to-wire victory in the Masters.
Spieth closed out his front nine with four consecutive birdies to take a 5-shot lead over England’s Danny Willett, and seemed poised to become just the fourth back-to-back champion in tournament history.
When Spieth got up-and-down from the back bunker on the par-3 12th for a stunning quadruple bogey less than 45 minutes after the last of his four straight birdies, his commanding 5-shot lead was suddenly transformed into a 3-stroke deficit. Spieth played holes 10, 11 and 12 in 6-over par, with a pair of bogeys leading up to his meltdown at the short but perilous 12th, where he dumped two shots into Rae’s Creek.
Willett, a late-blooming European star, rattled off three birdies in a 4-hole stretch beginning at the par-5 13th, and found himself in control of golf’s most celebrated event with only two holes left to play.
After birdies at 13, 15 and 16, Willett was two in front of playing partner Lee Westwood and long-hitting Dustin Johnson, who carded five birdies in a 10-hole stretch to put himself in position for another disappointing finish in a major championship.
Johnson predictably flamed out with a double bogey at the 17th, while Westwood three-putted the 16th for bogey after a spectacular chip-in eagle at the 15th got him within a shot of Willett. Like Johnson, Westwood has a history of close calls in majors, with his tie for second giving him nine career top-3 finishes in the four Grand Slam events.
While his three remaining challengers all struggled over the closing holes at Augusta National, Willett produced an exceptional chip shot from beyond the 17th green to save par. He followed with a drive that spilt the fairway at the 18th, and got a fortuitous bounce on his approach shot that left him with an easy two-putt par that clinched his victory.
Willett matched the best score of the final round with a 5-under 67, and wound up with a 3-shot margin over Westwood and Spieth, who recovered from his disaster at the 12th with birdies at 13 and 15 to give himself a chance to force a playoff.
An excellent tee shot at the par-3 16th left Spieth with a birdie putt of less than 10 feet that would have pulled him within a shot of Willett, with an inviting pin position at the 18th providing the realistic hope of a 72nd hole birdie and extra holes in the fading daylight of a late April afternoon in Augusta.
Spieth’s uncanny putting touch had kept him in the lead for the entire tournament for a second straight year, offsetting some shaky ball striking that resulted in an exorbitant number of shots that sailed wide right, both off the tee and on approaches. This time, Spieth’s putter failed him. He missed his birdie attempt on the 16th and bogeyed the 17th after another errant iron shot to seal his fate.
After a where-did-that-come-from 41 on the back nine, Spieth tied for second with Westwood at 2-under for the tournament, three behind Willett. After winning the first two majors of 2015, Spieth has placed second twice and finished one shot out of a playoff in the last three majors, with the 2016 Masters the only one of the three he lost due to his own failures.
Most of the post-Masters commentary and reporting focused on Spieth’s back-nine meltdown, much as occurred 20 years ago when Greg Norman shot an ugly 78 to turn a 6-stroke lead over Nick Faldo after 54 holes into a 5-shot defeat.
Even with his bogey-bogey-quad collapse at 10, 11 and 12 and an unseemly back nine 41, Spieth shot 73 on Sunday, and was one lousy swing away from a 69 and another green jacket. He carded seven birdies on the day and had a good look for an eighth at 16, a far cry from Norman’s awful final round effort in 1996.
Spieth displayed character with his birdies at 13 and 15 after squandering a sizeable lead, and it took a Faldo-like clutch effort by Willett to deny him a chance to win a second consecutive Masters. Spieth has finished second, first and T2 in his three Masters appearances, giving up the lead late on the front nine two years ago to eventual champion Bubba Watson.
A tournament-best 66 gave Spieth a 2-shot lead after the opening round, and he remained in front despite a 74 under difficult conditions Friday and a Saturday 73.
Willett hung around near the top of the leader board for three days before making a Sunday surge. He trailed Spieth by just three shots after 54 holes when Spieth let a lot of players back into contention with a bogey-double bogey finish.
A bogey at the 18th was Willett’s only blemish in a 70 that left him inside the top 10 after the opening round, and he remained four behind Spieth in a tie for eighth after 36 holes with a 74 that included a lone birdie at the third.
Willett cut his deficit from four to three after a Saturday 72, which included stretches on each nine where he alternated bogeys with birdies. Birdies at 6 and 8 Sunday moved Willett within a shot of Spieth before the leader’s birdie run separated him from the field.
While Spieth was making bogeys on 10 and 11, Willett carded birdies at 13 and 14 to cut his 5-shot deficit to three and then one. He was one ahead of Westwood and Johnson before making birdie at 16, and wound up winning by three over Westwood and Spieth with a 5-under 283 total, the highest winning score in Augusta since Zach Johnson won at 1-over 289 in 2007.
After moderate breezy conditions on Thursday, the scoring average rose significantly as the wind increased in strength on Friday and Saturday. The low score Friday was 71, with Smylie Kaufman (69) and 58-year-old Bernhard Langer (70) the only players under 71 on Saturday. Both faltered the next day, with Langer struggling to a 79 and Kaufman fading to 81 while playing in the final twosome with Spieth.
Dustin Johnson tied for fourth at 287 with Paul Casey and J.B. Holmes, who took advantage of calmer playing conditions to close with scores of 67 and 68 respectively.
Matthew Fitzpatrick, one of five Englishmen to finish in the top 10, birdied four of his last five holes to match the low score of the day (67) and tied for seventh at even par with Soren Kjeldsen and Shigeki Maruyama.
A powerhouse group that included pre-tournament favorites Jason Day, Rory McIlroy and Justin Rose tied for 10th at 1-over 289, with McIlroy matching Spieth with seven birdies in a final round 71. McIlroy shot himself out of contention with a birdie-less 77 in the third round, spoiling a heavyweight final pairing on Saturday with Spieth.
Although he began the week as the 12th ranked player in the world, Willett was mostly known on this side of the Atlantic as the player who might have to miss the Masters because his wife was about to give birth. The baby was due to arrive on Masters Sunday, but was born the previous week, enabling Willett to compete at Augusta for just the second time.
Willett was still the latest player to arrive in Augusta, but his reduced preparation was outweighed by the experience of becoming a father for the first time.
Coming into the Masters, Willett was considered at the top of the list of darkhorse candidates due to his outstanding play internationally over the past year. He has played on the European Tour since 2008, and emerged as one of the game’s top players last year when he won the Nedbank Challenge in South Africa and the European Masters and tied for sixth in the British Open, finishing second on the tour’s money list behind McIlroy.
Willett finished 2015 strong, shooting a final round 62 in the HSBC Champions in China to place third, and tied for fourth in the European Tour finale in Dubai. He returned to Dubai to score his fourth European Tour victory early in 2016, and in his first U.S. start of the year, was a close third in the WGC Doral event, more than holding his own the final day along side Adam Scott, Bubba Watson, McIlroy and Phil Mickelson, who all joined him in the top five.
Before turning pro in 2008, Willett was the world’s top-ranked amateur, but won just once in his first six seasons on the European Tour before his breakthrough last year. Like Graeme McDowell, Willett played his college golf in Alabama, playing two seasons at Jacksonville State. He was named the OVC Freshman of the Year in 2007, and won the conference championship the next year, one of his college victories before returning home to play professionally.
Willett’s game is relatively similar to that of Spieth. Neither is particularly long nor accurate off the tee, but both hit a lot of greens and make more than their share of putts compared to their fellow pros. He was planning on joining the PGA Tour for the 2015-16 season, but delayed that decision because of the impending birth of his first child.