Rory McIlroy's Sunday charge gives hope that he'll win the Masters one day

AUGUSTA, Ga. – Rory McIlroy must have once used his cell phone on the grounds at Augusta National. Or he ran across a fairway. Or spit out a pimento cheese sandwich. There has to be some reason why this place has tormented him for 14 years running.

He’s held a lead on a Sunday. He’s been in the final pairing on a Sunday. But he’s never quite done anything like he did on this particular Sunday in 2022, charging up the leaderboard like a patron rushing to place a seat at Amen Corner. He punctuated his day with a chip from the bunker on 18 and one of the purest celebrations he's ever unleashed — an arms-up, club-flinging howl that brought back memories of the time when he owned the golf world, majors and all.

McIlroy crafted a magnificent eight-under round, his best in all the 52 trips he’s made around Augusta National. His Sunday 64 was the best of any player, in any round this week, by three strokes. He vaulted himself all the way into solo second place, behind only Scottie Scheffler, his finest finish ever at the Masters.

“I don't think I've ever walked away from this tournament as happy as I am today,” McIlroy said Sunday night. “I've played a really good round of golf, and it's my best-ever finish at Augusta. It's not quite enough [to win], but I'll certainly look back on this day with very fond memories.”

Sunday at Augusta was vintage McIlroy: golf good enough to dominate the field, coming just a tetch too late to matter.

Since joining the PGA Tour in 2009, McIlroy has been one of golf’s most inspiring, maddening, thrilling and infuriating players. He won four majors in short order from 2012 to 2014, and seemed more than ready to take over the Next Tiger mantle.

He’s also easily the most thoughtful public speaker on Tour, offering knowledgeable opinions on every major topic facing the game — the challenge of distance, the role of alternative golf leagues, the disgrace of Phil Mickelson. At 32, he’s already both a Ryder Cup legend and a not-very-elder statesman of the game.

McIlroy is also mired in the thick of a major-less drought that — incredible as it seems — is eight years and 28 majors and counting.

As his still-frequent Tour victories attest, and as Sunday underlined, McIlroy still has the talent to compete for wins almost every week on Tour. At Augusta, though, he specializes in the backdoor top 10, the move where he makes a Sunday run with all the pressure off and the leader already far in the distance. From 2014 to 2020, he reeled off finishes of T8, 4, T10, T7, T5, T21 and T5, and through that time he only had one realistic chance to win: 2018, when he started the final round in the final pairing alongside Patrick Reed.

That year, just like in the notorious Masters of 2011, McIlroy came into Sunday with the spotlight directly on him. Back in 2011, McIlroy led at the turn and proceeded to put his tee shot on the 10th so far into the pines he nearly hit a cabin dozens of yards off the fairway. In 2018, he started the day three strokes behind Patrick Reed but stumbled in the first two holes and never closed the gap.

Sunday, McIlroy began the day 10 strokes off the lead. He knew there was little realistic chance of catching someone playing as steadily as Scheffler, so why not get unrealistic? His player number this week is 63, and that seemed as good a target number as any.

So from his very first tee shot — a 306-yard rip to the heart of the first fairway — McIlroy decided he’d play loose. Clad in white slacks and a turquoise shirt, McIlroy birdied the first and began the classic Rory Strut — shoulders back, chest out, eyes on the next pin — that he hadn’t had much opportunity to break out around here lately.

“You go out there today and you give it a go, and if it doesn't quite work out, it doesn't really matter,” he said. “But if it does work out, you can have a day like this and have some fun.”

McIlroy understands the history of this place, understands that numbers are starting to pile up against him. Only two players have won the Masters in their 15th start or later, Mark O’Meara in his 15th and Sergio Garcia in his 19th. But he also knows now that he still has the ability to carve up Augusta in a way that literally no one else did … and with that knowledge comes the belief that one day, he’ll be slipping on a green jacket at last.

“I think I've had some really good Sundays here from a little further back, and it is about trying to channel whatever attitude that is that I bring into [those days] — the 66 I shot with Tiger in the final [round] in 2015, obviously today,” he said. “The more and more I did it, the more memories I build up and the more, if I do put myself in a position closer to the lead going into Sunday, that I can delve into that memory bank and try to use those memories and my experience to my advantage.”

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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter at @jaybusbee or contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com.