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This specific thing happened early Sunday at the Masters that let Jack Nicklaus know Rory McIlroy was ‘ticked’

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When Rory McIlroy pulled out his driver on the third hole in Sunday’s final round of the Masters, Jack Nicklaus figured that either anger or desperation already had overcome the Northern Irishman and that he had discarded his carefully conceived pre-tournament plan. Nicklaus was leaning toward the former.

“Rory got away from his game plan on Sunday, and he got away with it,” Nicklaus said Tuesday after hosting a charity event at Ohio State University in conjunction with the Memorial Tournament, the PGA Tour event he hosts in his hometown. The six-time Masters champion knew exactly how McIlroy intended to play Augusta National Golf Club because McIlroy had provided a shot-by-shot rundown over lunch the week before the 89th Masters.

The Golden Bear had listened to McIlroy intently and then gave his stamp approval, saying, “that’s exactly the way I would try to play the golf course.”

Seeking his first green jacket to complete the career Grand Slam, McIlroy began the final round Sunday with a two-stroke lead over U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau. After just two holes, he trailed DeChambeau by a shot.

“He made double bogey on the first hole,” Nicklaus said, “and did not birdie the second hole. And he had told me the week before [the tournament], I had asked him, how are you going to play the third hole? He said, ‘Three of my tee shots are going to be with the driver down underneath the green, and when the pin’s left, I’m going to lay it back.’ And then he drove it with the pin left, and I thought, ‘he’s ticked.’

“I said, ‘We’re going to find out whether he’s going to get away with it or not.’ And he did. He got away with it, but he got away with it by playing a beautiful pitch shot [to make birdie]. And I think he felt that inside himself that he was not playing the smart play by laying back. He was already rattled. To play that full shot in there, he might’ve even made a worse shot out of it. So he went and played it the other way and made birdie. And I think that set the tone for what happened the rest of the day.”

McIlroy, 35, went on to survive a topsy-turvy afternoon in which he had two double bogeys in a one-over 73, but he eventually won the Masters by defeating Justin Rose on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff with a three-foot birdie.

“I give him a world of credit,” said Nicklaus, winner of a record 18 major titles. “He had the whole golfing world with mountains on his shoulders, and he’s now gotten rid of them.

“The golf community wanted to see Rory complete his Grand Slam. More than winning the Grand Slam, he wanted to win the Masters, and the Masters has been his bugaboo for a while. He certainly made enough mistakes to lose the tournament, but he has so much talent, and he kept overcoming some of the things that he did … the four double bogeys. Nobody’s ever done that. But he did enough good things, and you got to think back and say, how much talent does he really have or must he have to overcome what he overcame? I’m very proud of him.”

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