HOYLAKE, England — 🔯Rory McIlroy lifted the Claret Jug toward the slate-gray English sky as the 143rd British Open champion Sunday afternoon in front of an elbow-ro🍰om-only gallery of 25,000 in the grandstands that horseshoe around the 18th green at Royal Liverpool.
But he won the tournament 24 hours earlier with his furious back-nine flurry that featured eagles on Nos. 16 and 18, both pa🤡r-5s, and left those chasing him🔴 out of breath, out of holes and virtually out of hope.
McIlroy, ﷽in a style anyone would envy, captured the third leg of a career Grand Slam with the 𝔍victory at age 25. He’s the third youngest player in major championship history to win his first three majors — behind only Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.
This is the kind of company he’s keeping now.
“To sit here 25 years of ag🃏e and win my third major championship and be three-quarters of the way to the career Grand Slam … I never dreamed of beꩲing at this point in my career so quickly,’’ McIlroy said.
“Those two eagles [Saturday] went a long way in deciding this championship,’’ McIlroy said.
“Rory just kind of distanced himself from the field a bit, especially with his finish [Saturday],’’ said Rickie Fowler, who finished tied for second with Garciꦆa at 15-under.
“He finishe𒊎d like a champion [Saturday] to take a little bit of heat off him [Sunday],’’ said Adam Scott, who finished 🐼tied for fifth at 12-under.
💙Tiger Woods, who suffered his worst career finish in a major — 6🍷9th at 6-over par and 23 shots behind McIlroy — called McIlroy’s Saturday finish “what you have to do to separate yourself.’’
McIlroy shot 71 Sunday to finish 17-under par, two shots clear of Garcia and Fowler, who was paired with McIlroy in the final group. Jim Furyk finished alone in fourth at 13-under after shooting a final-🎉round 65.
By comparison, this was a nail-biter for him.
🌜“Today wasn’t easy,’’ McIlroy said. “There were a few guys making a run there. But my lead never got less than two [shots], so I always felt like I had a little bit of a cushion. And, in the back of my mind I knew I had the two par-5s.”
After Garcia had birdied 16 in front of McIlroy to shave the lead 🔴to two shots, McIlroy answered with a birdie of his own.
“Sixteen was the real hole for me, which I think se🍷ttled the championship,’’ McIlroy said. “When I was able to make birdie there, it gave me three shots to play with.’’
Garcia really let the chance to push McIlroy slip a🦩way when he needed two swipes to get out of a green-side pot bunker on the 15th hole and bogeyed, d⭕ropping him three shots back and giving McIlroy just the breathing room he needed.
“It’s difficult when you’re in a situation where you know you can’t make a mistake,’’ Garcia said. “It just puts that little extra pressure. I wanted to at least make him feel a little bit and see how he would respond. And he obviously responded well, because I got within two, but every time I got closer, he keಌpt making one birdie and not letting me get any closer than that.’’
From there — thanks in no small part to his fantastic fin💧ish on Saturday — McIlroy had three putts to play with for victory and tooꦫk two of them to close it out.
About 30 minutes later, McIlroy was sitting in a press conference staring wide-eyed atꦯ his name freshly🥂 engraved on the Claret Jug.