AUSTIN, Texas — Tiger Woods finally met his match Saturday, and it wasn’t Rory McIlroy.
Lucas Bjerregaard delivered the clutch shots so often seen from Woods to tie the match on the 16th hole and beat him on the 18th hole in a shocking conclusion when Woods missed a 4-foot putt. The victory sends the 27-year-old Dane into the semifinals of the Dell Technologies Match Play.
“It’s a shame it had to end the way it did,” Bjerregaard said. “Our match didn’t deserve that. But I’m happy to be on the winning side.”
Equally surprising was how Woods won earlier Saturday against McIlroy, a big match between the two biggest stars left at Austin Country Club. McIlroy was on the verge of squaring the match on the 16th hole when he had a short iron for his second shot into the par-5 16th. He made 7, however, and Woods closed him out on the next hole.
McIlroy was so angry he walked briskly away into a cart, and wouldn’t make eye contact on his way to the car.
Woods knows the feeling.
He and Bjerregaard were in the same spot below the hill on the 18th, just under 50 yards from the hole. Woods went first, and his lob wedge came out soft and into a bunker. He blasted out nicely to 4 feet, but then his putt to send the match to extra holes spun off the left lip.
“This is going to sting for a few days,” Woods said of his last event before the Masters.
Bjerregaard, who won his first European Tour title last fall at St. Andrews in the Dunhill Links, faces Matt Kuchar on Sunday morning in the semifinals.
Kuchar had to cope with a contentious moment in his 2-up victory over Sergio Garcia, two players in the news this year for all the wrong reasons.
Garcia had an 8-foot par putt on No. 7 to win the hole and square the match. He left it just short, then casually stabbed at it from the other side as it rimmed around the cup. Such putts typically are conceded. Kuchar said that was his intention. But under the rules, a putt can’t be conceded after a player hits it.
Kuchar says he didn’t want to win the hole that way. That’s when Garcia suggested if he felt that way, he could concede the next hole.
“I thought about it and said, ‘I don’t like that idea, either,'” he said.
Garcia needed to birdie the 18th hole to send the match into extra holes, missed the green and wound up conceding.
“At the end of the day, I’m the one that made the mistake,” Garcia said.
Overlooked in all the drama was British Open champion Francesco Molinari, who steamrolled his way into the semifinals. Molinari, at No. 7 the only player from the top 20 remaining, has played only 73 holes in five matches. He is the only player to have not lost a match, and the only one left who has not played the 18th hole.
“I can play 27 holes per match, that’s not really the point,” Molinari said after his 6-and-5 victory over Kevin Na. “It’s nice, obviously, to close it out early, but I’m ready to go as long as it takes.”
Kevin Kisner became only the third player to lose a match in group play and advance to the semifinals. He lost to Ian Poulter on Wednesday but has been rock-solid ever since, winning three straight holes late to flip his match in a 2-and-1 victory over Louis Oosthuizen.
This is the second straight year Kisner has reached the semifinals. He lost in the championship match last year to Bubba Watson.
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