For 17 years, Sergio Garcia has searched for his Holy Grail — a major championship.
Time and again, he has experienced heartbreak and frustration to the point where he once declared that he didn’t think he was capable of winning that elusive major.
On a sunny Sunday afternoon at the Augusta National Golf Club, the planets finally aligned, the birds sang in Spanish and the spirit of Seve Ballesteros touched the 37-year-old the fans in Spain call El Nino.
With a stroke of his putter on the 73rd hole of the 81st Masters championship, Garcia holed a birdie putt that defeated Justin Rose and earned the gregarious Spaniard his own Green Jacket.
In 1999, Sergio was in the Butler Cabin as the tournament’s low amateur. He watched countryman Jose Maria Olazabal don the jacket for the second time. On Sunday, it was Garcia slipping into the jacket, held for him by 2016 champion Danny Willett.
Garcia exhaled, loud enough so you could hear it easily. “Oooo, it’s been such a long time coming,” he sighed.
The Green Jacket was on his back, taking place of the 500-pound monkey that sat on it for his entire career in the majors. It took 74 of them for the special moment to finally arrive.
Garcia prevailed in a tougher than nails back nine battle with Rose, the 2013 U.S. Open champion and Olympic Gold Medalist. The two European stars separated themselves from the rest of the field. It was just the two of them by the 13th hole. And it was that 13th hole that would begin to turn the tide Garcia’s way.
“I felt a calmness I’ve never felt on a major Sunday,” Garcia confessed in the Butler Cabin. “The par at 13, I didn’t feel like I hit that bad a drive but it went in the hazard. Hit a good third and fourth shot. The par was big, I knew I was playing well enough to make something happen after that.”
It was on that 13th green where Garcia made a clutch par putt and Rose missed his birdie attempt. Garcia came in trailing Rose by two shots and it looked like it could have grown to four, but the make-miss in Garcia’s favor kept him in the hunt. At 14 Garcia did make something happen. He hit is approach to five feet, made birdie and cut Rose’s lead to a shot, setting the stage for the day’s big moment at the par five 15th.
“I probably hit one of the best eight-irons I’ve ever hit,” Garcia said of his second shot from 176 yards at 15. It nearly flew in the hole, settling 10 feet away. Rose hit it on the back fringe and putted to seven feet. Garcia then holed his eagle putt and send the patrons into a frenzy. Rose kept his composure, made his and they were tied at nine-under with three holes to play.
Garcia followed that up with a brilliant eight-iron into 16, just four feet from the hole. Rose answered with a great shot of his own, just eight feet from the cup. This time, the make-miss sequence went Rose’s way when he birdied and Garcia hit a weak, pitiful putt.
A big par putt miss by Rose from seven feet at the 17th sent it to 18 tee even up — both were nine-under.
At 18, Rose missed from nine feet opening the door for Garcia. But Sergio refused to step through it, badly missing his six-footer for birdie.
Rose’s ball striking let him down on 18, the first playoff hole. His drive sailed right, crashed into the trees and settled behind the large Magnolia on the corner. His punch shot barely got past Garcia’s drive. Sergio then hit another brilliant iron shot to 10 feet while Rose left his third 14 feet right of the hole.
Rose missed, leaving the stage for Garcia in a situation where he could not lose. Two putts for a major and Garcia holed it for birdie and let loose with emotions of joy and relief that he had stored up for nearly two decades.
“He’s had his share of heartbreak,” Rose said after watching his friend and Ryder Cup teammate prevail. “It was a wonderful battle with Sergio. I think this is a tournament I’ll win one day. I still have a bunch of good years in me.”
Garcia later looked back a couple of decades. “In 1999, I thought this course would give me one major, but I’m not gonna lie, I started to change my mind.”
Garcia finally took his place alongside the great Spanish Masters champions — Ballesteros (’80, ’83) and Olazabal (’84, ’99). “They are my idols,” Garcia quickly pointed out.
Sunday would have been Seve’s 60th birthday, were he still alive.
There was no better stage for Garcia to finally prevail, no better time than Seve’s birthday.
It was Masters Magic in its purest form and a fitting end to a 17-year search for Sergio’s Holy Grail.
