Europe holds off ferocious USA rally to retain Ryder Cup

James O'Connell, New York Daily News on Sep 28, 2025

Published in Golf

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FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — Team USA needed a miracle on Sunday to win the Ryder Cup and for much of Sunday afternoon, the dream was intact.

However, Shane Lowry’s seven-foot putt on the 18th green of Bethpage Black to win the hole and push his match against Russell Henley gave Europe 14 points, which was enough to retain the Ryder Cup. The final total was 15-13 in favor of Europe, the outright winners of the 45th Ryder Cup.

“I said to my caddie walking down 18, ‘I’ve got an opportunity to do the greatest thing I’ve ever done today,’ and I did it. And I’m very proud of myself,” Lowry said.

Keegan Bradley’s squad put up a massive fight as they entered the day with a 12-5 point deficit after two miserable performances on Friday and Saturday. USA won five out of the first seven matches — including one push with Bryson DeChambeau’s massive comeback against Matt Fitzpatrick from as many as five-down.

The Americans needed to win all of the final four matches to complete the most improbable comeback in Ryder Cup history.

They appeared to be in good shape to do so, as evidenced by the roaring Long Island crowd down the stretch. However, Lowry’s putt put all of that to an end as Europe won the cup as back-to-back winners.

“Yeah, the boys really fought today,” Bradley said. “That was incredible. I didn’t expect anything different. These guys are really an incredible group. And you know, they played the last two days when we were way down. You wouldn’t have known we were way down. They looked like they were battling.

“Their body language was good. They were pumping up the crowd. They were fighting the whole way, even when things were not looking good, and I didn’t expect anything different today than these guys who are determined, proud and playing for each other, playing for their team, playing for their country, and they showed the world today that, really, anything is possible. That was a coin flip there for a second.”

One of the controversies of the tournament was how Bradley set up the course, as is his duty as home captain. The captain significantly cut down the rough of Bethpage Black — which is known for its notorious difficulty and nasty rough — because he believed it gave his team an advantage.

However, he ended up being very wrong and admitted he would have done things differently and made a mistake.

“We tried to set the course up to help our team,” Bradley said. “Obviously, it wasn’t the right decision. I think anytime you’re the leader of a team or the captain or the coach, or whatever, we talked about this last night, you’re going to get the accolades and you need to take the blame for when things don’t go well.

“I definitely made a mistake on the course setup. I should have listened a little bit more to my intuition. For whatever reason, that wasn’t the right way to set the course up. The greens were as soft as I’ve ever seen greens without it raining. Especially here, it can get pretty firm, and they never firmed up.”

With every point being so crucial for Team USA, Viktor Hovland of Europe was unable to play his scheduled match against Harris English due to a neck injury. However, Europe did not have to forfeit the match, instead, each team was awarded half of a point, as is the rules. Bradley vehemently disagreed with the rule, however, European captain Luke Donald said there was not a debate about this longstanding rule.

“I think [the rule has] been in place since 1971," Donald said. “The U.S. have used it before. I think it happened in 1991 with Steve Pate. That was a tight Ryder Cup, too, 14 1/2-13 1/2. It happened in 1993; Sam Torrance couldn’t play with an injured toe. The U.S. won that one.

“We have contracts for a reason, a captains’ agreement for a reason, for situations that occur.”

Receiving plenty of attention was Golf fans’ rude welcome to a hostile New York sports environment. Fans were plenty rough to Rory McIlroy throughout the week as he had several instances of shouting back at fans that were saying things toward him that he felt crossed the line.

The 2025 Masters champion said it was a particularly tough week for him with all of the verbal abuse he received.

“Look, I don’t think we should ever accept that in golf,” McIlroy said. “I think golf should be held to a higher standard than what was seen out there this week. Golf has the ability to unite people. Golf teaches you very good life lessons. It teaches you etiquette. It teaches you how to play by the rules. It teaches you how to respect people.

"Sometimes this week we didn’t see that. So no, this should not be what is acceptable in the Ryder Cup. But you know, we will be making sure to say to our fans in Ireland in 2027 that what happened here this week is not acceptable, and for me, it’s — you know, come and support your home team.”

The next Ryder Cup will take place in 2027 at Adare Manor in Limerick, Ireland, and for Team USA, they will go in as losers of two consecutive tournaments.

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