Following hours and hours of extended brilliance, Jason Spieth’s Masters coronation celebration paused briefly late Saturday afternoon to allow the man of the day to kick around a nasty double-bogey on the tournament’s 53rd hole. A huge lead was almost halved. Cue the organ music.
Piffle. The kid’s still got this. Right?
Spieth, who has led the 79th Masters just about since lacing his spikes on Thursday, watched his seven-stroke lead shrink to four over the final two holes of the third round. The clumsy double on No. 17, combined with a stirring back-nine 31 by Britisher Justin Rose, left Spieth still in control, if slightly clammy.
His 2-under-par 70, which included seven birdies, lost just one shot from his five-shot lead when the day began. His three-round 200 (16 under) broke the 54-hole record 201, set by Raymond Floyd in 1976 and later tied by Tiger Woods in his record-setting 1997 performance.
“Obviously being 4 under at one point in the round and closing it out at 2 under is disappointing,” Spieth said. “Obviously, I would have liked to have finished the round a bit better but it also could have been worse.”
But by edging back within shooting range of Rose and Phil Mickelson, who is five shots back after shooting 67, the tone of Spieth’s tournament changed in the final 30 minutes. The youngest player left in the field, Spieth, 21, still has his first major title in sight but he’s also been here before, leading last year’s tournament with 11 holes to play before Bubba Watson rushed passed for a three-stroke victory.
“Hopefully what I learned about myself today is I saw a lot of putts go in,” said Spieth, who needed 30 putts Saturday after taking 50 in his first two rounds. “That’s something in the weekend, under pressure, that has hurt me a little bit and recently, I’ve been making a lot of putts.”
Six shots back is Charley Hoffman (71) while Tigers Woods and Rory McIlroy carded twin 68s but could only creep to within 10 shots of the lead.
Only four players in Masters history have lost the tournament after leading by four or more shots entering the final round: McIlroy (2011), Ken Venturi (1956), Ed Snead (who led by five in 1979) and Greg Norman (who led by six shots in 1996).
Rose, entering the day seven shots off the pace, finished in a sprint, birdieing five of the final six holes, including holing out from the bunker on the right on the par-3 16th. His 20-foot birdie on No. 18, a speed ride from behind the hole, helped him leap from fourth place and eight shots back to second place at 204. The usually sedate Britisher was inclined to break out the varsity fist-pump.
“Jordan was so far ahead that it was almost, you were just playing your own game and you can’t get too aggressive around here,” said Rose, the 2013 U.S. Open champion who has just two top-10 finishes in his previous nine Masters. “You can take your chances when they come. I mean, I was doing all the right things.”
None of that might have happened if Spieth had hit a 39-yard pitch into No. 17 some 14 yards short to the green’s front edge, from where he three-putted for 7. He was able to save par on No. 18 with a critical nine-footer after hitting a beautiful flop wedge from out of the gallery on the right side.
“That just took some guts,” Spieth said, “and having been in this scenario or having been in contention enough, having been on the Tour a few years, I felt comfortable enough playing that full flop.”
Mickelson briefly closed to within four shots by canning a 41-foot putt for birdie on No. 16. But he bogeyed No. 17 after three-putting from 46 feet.
“If (Spieth) were to come out on top, it would be wonderful for the tournament, wonderful for the game,” Mickelson said. “I’m going to try and stop him but we’ll see how it goes.”
After a lackluster opening 27 holes, McIlroy, the world’s top-ranked player, came back to life. In danger of missing the cut on Friday, he had closed out his second round with a 31 before firing a 4-under 68 Saturday, taking nine shots from par to deliver him to the final round at 6-under 210. But his quest for a third straight major title as well as completing his career Grand Slam was diminished by a closing bogey that left him 10 shots off the pace.
“I’m going to need something basically around 61 or 62 to have a real chance,” McIlroy said, not adding that either number would set a course record. “I’m not sure that’s going to happen but we’ll see.”
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