A Major Meltdown for Lefty

All Phil Mickelson had to do was hit the fairway on the par-four finishing hole.

Instead, he hit a tent.

Mickelson was 450 yards and a walk from victory: driver, iron and a two-putt.

A dogleg left turned ugly, though, and now the golf historians, not necessarily forgiving types, will be left to assess the damage.

Geoff Ogilvy ended up winning the 106th U.S. Open on Sunday at Winged Foot.

And Phil Mickelson ended up losing it.

There is no simpler way to say it.

Ogilvy shot two-over-par 72 on the final round and finished five-over 285 for 72 holes. He played four over for his last 11 holes but closed with four consecutive pars.

“It’s pretty hard to believe,” Ogilvy said.

Ask Mickelson about it.

He made double bogey on the 72nd hole, when par would have won and bogey would have forced a playoff today.

He lost by one heat stroke.

“It hurts,” Mickelson said. “I had it in my grasp, but I let it go.”

In 1939, Sam Snead lost out of a U.S. Open playoff by making a triple bogey on the 72nd hole. It took until Sunday for someone to come up with something as gut-wrenching.

Mickelson shot four-over 74 and finished six-over 286 for the tournament, which left him fit-to-be-tied for second place with Colin Montgomerie and Jim Furyk.

Ireland’s Padraig Harrington finished two shots back at seven-over 287.

Montgomerie, as it turns out, could have won with a par at 18. But, playing two groups ahead of Mickelson, he also made double at the last and was denied a chance to become the first European since Tony Jacklin in 1970 to win the U.S. Open.

So, the title went Down Under.

What you need to know about Ogilvy: He is 29, gracious, an Australian, and he now rules.

Hard to believe, yes.

All those years Australian Greg Norman grew older trying to hand-wring a U.S. Open crown and couldn’t do it. There was that cruel time, in 1984 at Winged Foot, that Fuzzy Zoeller picked Norman’s pocket by winning an 18-hole playoff.

“No one ever gave him the luck I got today,” Ogilvy said of Norman. “It’s like Arnold [Palmer], that’s what Greg is to Australia.”

Ogilvy will, and should, get all credit due.

In the end, smashed between golfing titans, he endured and survived.

Ogilvy’s drive on the 18th landed in a divot, but he said he caught the right part of it. So then he hit his second shot to the green and watched it dribble back toward him. No worries, though, Ogilvy made a career-defining up-and-down to save par, sneaking in a six-foot putt under extreme conditions.

Mickelson, meanwhile, was waiting near the fairway, but not on it. He hit only two fairways all day; No. 18 wasn’t one of them.

“I’m still in shock that I did that,” said Mickelson, who could be seen mouthing the words “Oh, no!” when the shot left his club. “I just couldn’t hit a fairway all day.”

Mickelson’s carom shot landed in tramped-down grass, with fans lining a hitting area carved out by marshals, still needing only bogey to force a playoff with Ogilvy.

But you may have heard, in golf, about the wheels coming off?

Mickelson’s second shot hit a tree and advanced only a few yards toward the hole. His third shot went splat in the bunker -- a fried egg as they call it -- and his blast-out attempt to win rolled so fast by the hole it didn’t even have a chance to say hello.

Now Mickelson needed a miracle chip from the rough to make bogey and get some playoff sleep, but his shot didn’t come close and Ogilvy won while watching on television.

People may remember Mickelson’s collapse more than Ogilvy’s efforts, but the Aussie did what you have to do in these pressure-type atmospheres -- keep your wits intact.

He made a sensational sand save at the par-three 13th, his ball hitting the pin and bouncing to within a putter blade of the cup. Then he chipped in for par on the par-four 17th hole, making what he did on No. 18 matter.

“What do you say?” Ogilvy said of his shot on 17. “I mean, a shot that you wait your whole life to chip it in in a situation like that when you need to, and then you do.”

Only holes before, all this drama could not have been imagined.

A birdie putt at the par-four 14th hole gave Mickelson a two-shot lead and put a sun-saturated New York crowd into coronation mode.

Turns out the game was just heating up.

At the par-four 16th, Mickelson misdirected yet another tee shot.

Earlier, on the front nine, a bystander with a beer cup yelled advice to Mickelson.

“You’re not keeping your weight back!” the man screamed.

“Shut up, you hack,” another guy said.

On the 17th green, with Mickelson struggling on his rear flank, Montgomerie rolled in a 70-foot birdie putt, a sweeping left-to-right bender, that put him at four over.

Mickelson’s tee shot at 16 cost him bogey and suddenly he and Montgomerie were tied.

Was this finally going to be the day for Scotland’s Montgomerie, trying to steal his first major win after years of toil and heartbreak?

He stood in the 18th fairway after a perfect drive, 171 yards from the pin. A good second shot and a two-putt gets him in the clubhouse at four over.

Montgomerie hit his approach iron well short into the deep stuff.

“I switched from a six to a seven [iron],” he said. “I thought adrenaline would kick in.... It was a poor shot, no question about that.”

He wrist-flipped his chip 30 feet past the pin and then rolled his comeback 12-foot past the hole before he two-putted for a double bogey.

Ouch.

“This is as difficult as it gets,” Montgomerie said. “You wonder sometimes why you put yourself through this.”

Ogilvy escaped Winged Foot with his first major. Not yet 30, he might win more. In three U.S. Open appearances, he has gone from missing the cut, to tied for 28th to champion.

Palmer is known as “the King” in golf, but Ogilvy is distantly related to Scotland’s King of Bannockburn, Robert the Bruce.

Ogilvy now joins golf royalty.

Montgomerie, who turns 43 next week, may never get another whiff. He has lost majors before, but none like this.

“This is the first time I’ve really messed up,” Montgomerie said.

Mickelson has finished second in the U.S. Open for a fourth time. He also finished second in 1999, 2002 and 2004.

He was trying to become the third person since 1934 to win three consecutive majors, joining Ben Hogan and Tiger Woods. Mickelson had a posterity buzz working as fans lavished praise and the pundits began contemplating his place in history.

Mickelson now heads to this year’s British Open, at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, England, without a chance at the Grand Slam.

“This one is going to take a while to get over,” Mickelson said. “This one hurts more than any tournament because I had it won.”

He added, “As a kid I dreamt of winning this tournament ... it really stings.”

No one was arguing.

*

Final scores

At Winged Foot Golf Club, par-70

G. Ogilvy 71-70-72-72 -- 285

J. Furyk 70-72-74-70 -- 286

C. Montgomerie 69-71-75-71 -- 286

P. Mickelson 70-73-69-74 -- 286

P. Harrington 73-69-74-71 -- 287