He improved over the performances of Jim Furyk in 2003 at Olympia Fields and he even surpassed the out-of-this-world performance by Tiger Woods in the 2000 US Open at Pebble Beach. We can’t forget that this has been only 2 months after the young McIlroy suffered that final day collapse in Augusta National during the Masters. It was such a painful thing to see, for he deserved to win, and if he wasn’t meant to win his first Masters so young, he shouldn’t had to deal with such an crushing collapse when there where only 9 holes left to go. On the press conference, after winning the title, McIlroy looked so much older and wiser than he seemed just four days ago. “I felt like I got over the Masters pretty quickly. I kept telling you guys that, and I don’t know if you believed me or not. But here you go,” McIlroy said in the press conference, pointing at the shiny prize on the table. “Nice to prove some people wrong.” Not only did he prove a few people wrong, he also made a name for himself in the history of the sport.
He has set a new record for the US Open tournament, and at 22-years-old the talented son of a Irish bartender who had to work three different jobs to keep his son’s dream alive, became the youngest player since 1923 to win the US Open Championship. To really put this into perspective, we need to analyze just how good his numbers where in this tournament. The combined scores of the last 10 U.S. Open champions were 14-under par. McIlroy was 16 under. He finished eight shots ahead of Jason Day, whose score of 8-under 276 would have been enough to win 26 of the last 30 U.S. Opens.