AUGUSTA, Ga. — Friday night at the Masters is unlike any other day at the venue. The setting sun casts long shadows, stale beer echoes down the hallway, and cigar smoke suggests the direction the wind blows. The crisp, crisp depiction of the golf course seems to intensify as half of the field reaches finality. A week that started with hopes and dreams of maybe wearing the green jacket is met with disappointed looks, slumped shoulders, and thoughts of what went wrong.
As patrons pass through the exit, the roar brings the possibility of invisible movement. As a yell came from below reaching the main leaderboard near the entrance, people heading in the opposite direction realized that Rory McIlroy was on their leaderboard.
The defending champion, lifetime Grand Slam winner and five-time major holder opened up a historic gap over the rest of the field. 6 strokes up with 36 holes left. The final outcome some of their contemporaries encountered on Friday may have felt more than just those going home early.
Entering the weekend, McIlroy’s six-stroke lead is the largest in tournament history. His second ninth on Friday, as the sun set beneath the Georgia pine trees, was nothing short of ridiculous. Even though his driver’s superpowers weren’t cooperating — McIlroy ranked second-last in the field this week in terms of driving accuracy — he strutted around as if he had a cape around his neck.
But it wasn’t his strength or ability to fly that made him seem like a superhero. Rather, it was his cunning, skill, and knowledge of Augusta National. McIlroy is experienced enough to know that once he accelerates, he should keep his foot on the gas instead of letting up.
“You can’t guard,” McIlroy said. “Go out there, play free, keep swinging. A big part of the lesson from the 2011 Masters to the 2011 U.S. Open was don’t get defensive. Go out there and keep playing, keep trying to get birdies and stay as trusting and committed as possible.”
Looking back on his 2025 Masters victory, McIlroy said there was a moment on Sunday when he felt like he wasn’t playing aggressively — the par-5 13th. He dropped No. 3 at Ray’s Creek for a double bogey, and followed it up with a bogey on the 14th, setting many players back.
That’s what can happen around Augusta National if you let your guard down, regardless of your position. It could be the guy in first place, or it could be the guy who’s just happy to have slipped through the cut line and gotten 36 more holes on the golf course. No one knows that better than McIlroy. McIlroy will certainly be hoping to learn from the lessons of the last Masters and have a less stressful coronation on Sunday. Even if there are some rocks on the way to get there.
“I just want to go out there and play two good rounds again,” McIlroy said. “Obviously, this golf course has certain characteristics where guys can run, they can do eagles, and you can hear the roar all over the golf course.
“I think the next two days are days for me to really focus on myself. It’s hard to avoid the big leaderboards, but I know I’m in the lead, so I don’t have to keep checking it all the time. So for me, it’s best to really focus on myself and stay in my own little world outside.”
Visible history and background
With historic leeway in hand, McIlroy now has monumental implications in mind. He could become the fourth player to successfully defend his Masters title, tying him with one of the previous three (Nick Faldo) for the most major titles won by a European player. There are a lot of boxes he can check off, but he’ll have to wait until Sunday evening if he has the chance.
That history looks to the future, but it’s the history McIlroy has already built that informs what happened Friday. The way McIlroy rose to the top of the leaderboard in 2025 feels awfully similar, minus one big mistake (namely the double bogey that Jack Nicklaus told him not to do). It’s hard to forget that McIlroy made a record four double bogeys en route to victory last year, but he credits the victory to the 14 holes from Friday to Saturday.
Those seven holes this Friday consisted of six birdies. 7 holes on Saturday? Well, we’ll have to wait and see.
“I told the story last year that I really won the tournament on 14 holes, the last nine on Friday and the first five on Saturday,” McIlroy said. “Well, as soon as I stood on the 12th tee, I knew I had a chance, but I didn’t expect to birdie six of the last seven.
“It just shows you what you can do here. … I’ve never played tournament golf, but I often want to get up here and play. I’ve been preparing for this Masters the same way I’ve prepared for the last time I’ve played. I think all the work I’ve been working on around the greens over the past three weeks has definitely paid off over the last two days.”
captain america
After Sam Burns’ chance at the Masters seemed to be slipping away, he played a great round to keep it alive. He’ll be playing alongside McIlroy on Moving Day, but I can’t help but think of Patrick Reed when I look at the first page of this leaderboard.
Captain America, the 2018 Masters champion and globetrotter on the DP World Tour, would have been in the final draw alongside McIlroy had he not bogeyed the final hole. The right-hander with Duel 69 is at 6 under par and is closing in on a man with a rich history.
Past events include the 2016 Ryder Cup Sunday singles match, as well as much more. There was a day when Reed defeated McIlroy in the final round of the 2018 Masters. Most recently, a summons was issued to the Northern Irishman around the 2023 holidays, after a tee shot was fired at him at a driving range in Dubai.
McIlroy’s opponent last year was Bryson DeChambeau. If Reed can play his cards right on Saturday and grab some of Lowry’s lead heading into Sunday, he’ll relish the chance to thwart a chance at a back-to-back title, and his game is sharp and resourceful enough to do so if the stars align.
“After winning in ’18, I knew at that point that I definitely wanted to do it a second time,” Reed said. “I think the most important thing is that as a golfer you always dream of winning the green jacket. As a player and as a professional golfer you always have to believe that you can do it.
“Until that happens, there’s always that little voice of doubt in the back of my head. Now, I was able to get a shutout in ’18 and have given myself some good opportunities since then. Hopefully I can move on and get a second chance.”
Masters rarity
All 18 greens have been hit at Augusta National only three times in the past 30 years, the most recent being on Friday. Tyrrell Hatton, who had a complicated relationship with the golf course, had perfect command of his irons and set up 18 different looks for birdies.
The Englishman converted seven of them, and while a final three-putt bogey may have derailed Dinner’s plans, his performance was a masterclass in terms of angles and, oddly, in the context of Hatton, temperament.
“The course this morning, the greens…I feel like they were softer than they were at the end of yesterday’s round,” Hatton said. “If you imagine the guys playing this afternoon, or all afternoon, they’re probably going to be at the same level that we had yesterday, just a lot more solid and faster.
“So I think I made the most of the greens being a little soft this morning. Yeah, I gave myself a lot of chances. I would have liked to have seen more putts go in. I don’t feel like I actually holed that many putts. They were definitely outside seven or eight feet.”
Schaeffler’s rare items
This is the third time in 26 rounds at Augusta National that Scottie Scheffler has signed with a score of 72 or higher. It’s rare for Scheffler to post a performance better than par in any given week, especially at a field where he’s had a near-perfect record in seven outings. The result was a 2-over 74, putting Scheffler in the even-par position he started the week with.
So what went wrong with Scheffler on Friday? The simple answer is his inability to convert scoring opportunities. Scheffler played the par 5 one over, but the score speaks for itself. He was in perfect position at No. 2, greenside, and hit one of the worst pitches of the week. A similar development occurred on the short par-4 third.
On the second nine, Scheffler split the fairway on both the 13th and 15th. He caught water on his second shot on both holes, resulting in two bogeys. For Scheffler, the fix will be easy over the weekend, but it seems too late.
“I want to hole a few more putts,” Scheffler said. “I felt like I was rolling well today, but…the ball just wasn’t falling. Maybe my read was a little off. I felt like I started online and maybe got some speed on a few putts, but overall I felt like my score was off today. I felt like I definitely played better than I did in A. I got back even and had some par 5s in front of me, but it was frustrating that I didn’t do a lot of things that I felt were wrong and couldn’t convert.”
ryder cup europe
As Justin Rose and McIlroy battled it out in the closing stages and ultimately made it to the 2025 playoffs, Shane Lowry and Tommy Fleetwood sat in the clubhouse eating and drinking with their families and watched the game on television. They were watching two close friends play against each other at a game of golf.
Now they join the fight.
Lowry, Fleetwood and Rose are all 5 under, with one touchdown and one extra point, all worse than their European peers. Fleetwood had two eagles on Friday, but Lowry went around Augusta National without a drop shot. Rose, on the other hand, continued to play professionally and consistently in these areas, reaching 5 under par with birdies on holes 9-11. With two easy-to-play par 3s and two reachable par 5s, Rose quickly settled on that number and can look back on it as the number that defined the tournament.
quick switching
Brooks Koepka has had a whirlwind tournament, but that’s difficult when playing alongside Rose and Jordan Spieth. The five-time major champion had 11 birdies and eight bogeys in his first 36 holes to finish at 3 under. He had a bad ball Thursday, but he blamed it on changing driver settings too quickly.
“I just drove better,” Koepka said. “Some of the driver settings switched from A1 to B1. No one noticed it. We changed it back to A1, which is the normal setting and just drives better.”
How could that happen, much less in a major championship? Well, it happened. Koepka seemed to be feeling better after getting his driver back to its original settings, but it proved that even a five-time major champion with a simple point-and-shoot approach to golf (which is a compliment, by the way) can miss something.
