'This Will Either Make Or Break Rory McIlroy'

Rory McIlroy declined to speak to the media, got into his car and sped out of the Pinehurst parking lot immediately after Bryson DeChambeau won the 2024 US Open, in what will be the hardest loss of his entire career.

McIlroy was dialled in on the back nine at Pinehurst and led by two after making four birdies in five holes around the turn. Bryson DeChambeau was not taking command of the US Open like some thought he might and the door was well and truly open for McIlroy to walk right through it.

He bogeyed 15 after hitting a club too many long of the par 3, opting for a knock down 7 over a full-out 8-iron. What followed on 16 and 18 were truly harrowing.

After dropping a shot on 15, he then missed from 2ft 6in on the 16th. This was the putt that cost him the US Open. He found the green of the 540 yard par 4 in two and seemed like he was ready to get across the line - but he looked shaken after the short miss.

He managed to rally himself to make a brilliant par save on 17, where he got it down in two from the greenside bunker to hopefully get the wind back in sails.

That all came before he surprisingly opted for driver on the short 18th hole, where he had been hitting 3-wood previously, and pulled it left into the native area. That forced him to need an up-and-down from just short of the green and he did the first part well, chipping to 4ft - before really throwing away the US Open.

Perhaps the hole looked a lot smaller after his short miss on 16. Perhaps he was still shaking after what happened on 16 - which was his first miss from inside 3ft in his last 497 attempts.

After an agonising ending, McIlroy watched on from the scorer's tent, hoping for a DeChambeau bogey but Bryson's clutch bunker shot from 55 yards was one of the greatest Major shots of recent time. It left McIlroy in 2nd-place and licking his wounds.

He's a student of the game and a historian who knows that it's the Majors that really do count, and this one will hurt more than any of his previous near-misses. He was beaten by Wyndham Clark last year. Cam Smith flew past him at St Andrews in 2022. But this one was his, and it is going to hurt more and more as time goes on.

McIlroy has been good at bouncing back throughout his career. After his infamous Masters meltdown in 2011, he went and won the US Open just two months later.

After his Portrush heartbreak in 2019, where he missed the cut as The Open returned to Northern Ireland for the first time in 68 years, he went on to win the FedEx Cup and WGC-HSBC Champions over the following months. After the 2022 Open loss to Cam Smith he would also bounce back to win the FedEx Cup the following month.

Even this year, when he bogeyed the 72nd hole to lose the Dubai Invitational to Tommy Fleetwood, he went and won the Dubai Desert Classic the next week.

This was a true collapse, though, and it came on the grandest of stages in a career that has been desperate for a Major victory for ten years.

This will either make or break Rory McIlroy and could be career defining.

He's known his game is good enough to win Majors for 13 years now, but on Sunday he came so close to remembering how to get over the line again. Two missed putts inside 4ft in the last three holes cost him the chance at glory.

McIlroy is experienced enough to pick himself back up again and win at Troon in next month's Open in an almighty bounce back that would have vibes of the 2011 season.

Whether he does that is of course yet to be seen, but if he doesn't immediately bounce back, you feel that his chances of winning Major number five may never be so good again.

He faces a cross-section in his career now. He's done everything in the game barring win The Masters but if he doesn't go on and win more Majors, it might just be those last three holes at the 2024 US Open that people remember him for. And that would be sad.