2025 Ryder Cup: EUROPE LEADS THE U.S. 5 ½ - 2 ½ AFTER FIRST DAY

It remains a priceless aura of the Ryder Cup, when the late-afternoon session on Friday becomes so maddeningly delicious that you nearly forget all the wondrous morning happenings because there is so much invested in a warm twilight.

Of course, neither team could actually forget the morning foursomes Friday – the Euros gleefully pouncing to a 3-1 lead, the Americans likely haunted by a start that offered a painful reminder of Italy two years ago.

But with each team seizing a relatively comfortable afternoon four-ball win (Justin Thomas and Cam Young delivering a 6 and 5 win for the U.S. over Ludvig Åberg and Rasmus Højgaard; Jon Rahm and Sepp Straka pouring in birdies with equal ease in a 3 and 2 triumph over Scottie Scheffler and J.J. Spaun) the final hour or so was left to a pair of games that delivered magnificent drama.

For the record, those matches ended thusly: Justin Rose and Tommy Fleetwood holding on, 1-up over Americans Bryson DeChambeau and Ben Griffin; then Patrick Cantlay and Sam Burns scratching out a half-point with a tie against Europeans Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry.

It added up to a 5 ½ - 2 ½ first-day lead for Europe, which needs 14 points to retain the Cup, 14 ½ to win on American soil for the fourth time in the last eight visits.

But the last two games provided huge drama and left emotions swaying. There was the very real potential for a 3-1 European session to make the score 6-2. Similarly, it was up for grabs for the Americans to create a 2-2 session and close the gap to 5-3.

Ah, but what could have happened gave way to what did happen and it was delectable.

First, the Rose-Fleetwood and DeChambeau-Griffin match. The Americans had a 1-up lead through 10 holes at which time the Euros came alive. Fleetwood birdied the par-4 11th to tie and the par-3 14th to get his team 1-up.

Peppering flagsticks down the stretch, the hugely popular Fleetwood drained an 18-footer for birdie and a 2-up lead on 16, only Griffin stepped up big time – first with a tight birdie at the 174-yard 17th, then with an approach to 5 ½ feet at the 18th green.

It was great theater that got even better when Rose hit his approach to about 9 feet and when the oldest competitor in the field made it for a 1-up win, the buoyant Euro fans – of which there are many – let loose with cheers.

For a while, they figured their cheers could grow louder, only Cantlay was doing his best to salvage something out of the last game. He and Burns had trailed by two holes at the turn but Cantlay, perhaps showing that he might be team leader, birdied three times early on the back nine to pull his team even, after which the highlights really intensified.

At the par-4 16th, Cantlay made yet another birdie from 17 feet, but McIlroy matched it from 10.

At the par-3 17th, McIlroy made a birdie from 13 feet and Burns answered from 7.

At 18, there were three birdie tries from inside of 20 feet, but Lowry, then Burns, then McIlroy all missed to leave each side with a half-point. Fitting perhaps, since Cantlay and Burns had made five birdies on the back and McIlroy had put on a ball-striking exhibition but when the opportunity to exhale arrived, it was Europe that had to feel better about the scenario.

PGA of America Pool reporter, Jim McCabe