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Eldrick “Tiger” Woods, a prodigy for the reason that time he was a toddler, delivered on his future of golf greatness with a jaw-dropping 12-stroke victory in the Masters Tournament on this day in historical past, April 13, 1997.
“A win for the ages!” broadcaster Jim Nantz enthused, because the gallery erupted when Woods’ last putt dropped in the 18th gap.
His 12-shot victory over second-place finisher Tom Kite stays the best margin in the historical past of the storied golf event.
He continues to be the youngest winner in Masters historical past to this day.
Woods shot an unbelievable 18-under, which stood because the lowest-ever rating in the Masters till it was surpassed by Dustin Johnson in 2020 (-20).
Golf Digest known as the win by the 21-year-old phenom “the dawn of dominance” and an “epic victory that shook the game.”
Woods tore up all 4 rounds, together with a scintillating 65 (7-under) third spherical on Saturday that put him in a commanding place coming into the ultimate spherical.
“A win for the ages!” — Jim Nantz, broadcaster
“Tiger’s Grrrreat!” beamed the front-page headline of native newspaper Augusta Chronicle Sunday morning.
The last spherical proved a coronation, not a contest.
Woods, who turned professional solely seven months earlier, laid waste to a area of the best golfers in the sport.
“There’s a new era about to dawn at the most magical setting in golf,” CBS introduced because it opened its final-round broadcast.
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Woods, the community famous, “had power and grace like the game has never seen before.”
For almost twenty years he’d been groomed for this second.
“The final round of the Masters garnered its highest rating ever, and television ratings leaped whenever he played a tournament.” — Masters.com
Woods was famously given a golf membership the second he may stroll by his father Earl Woods, a U.S. Army Green Beret officer who served in Vietnam.
Tiger proved a pure. He shocked a nationwide TV viewers by driving golf balls at age 2 in entrance of Bob Hope on “The Mike Douglas Show.”
He dominated newbie golf as a youngster, successful a record three consecutive U.S. Junior Championships (1991-93), then including an NCAA golf title (1996) whereas enjoying for Stanford, amongst many different honors.
Woods turned professional in September 1996 and gained two PGA Tour occasions earlier than year-end. Sports Illustrated named him its “Sportsman of the Year” for 1996 and once more in 2000.
His innate potential, coupled with the calls for of a pushed father and his personal quest for excellence, gave Tiger’s ascendancy as an expert an air of inevitability witnessed by hundreds of thousands in the ultimate spherical of the 1997 Masters.
Woods, with an insurmountable lead, was adopted throughout the ultimate a number of holes by an electrified gallery entranced by the greatness unfolding in entrance of their eyes.
“A rhapsody of total appreciation and awe at a virtuoso performance like Augusta has never seen,” Nantz stated as Woods stepped onto the 18th inexperienced to safe his crown.
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“It is here that I left my youth behind and became a man,” Woods wrote to the host committee at Augusta National Saturday night time, the phrases learn on air as he performed his last putt.
“For that, I will eternally be in your debt.”
The reputation of golf soared in the wake of Woods’ masterful Masters.
“Woods’ dominant performance, and his mass appeal, had an immediate effect” on the game, notes Masters.com, the web site of Augusta National.
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“The final round of the Masters had garnered its highest rating ever, and television ratings leaped whenever he played a tournament. His first tournament after the Masters was the GTE Byron Nelson Golf Classic outside Dallas, which he won. The tournament sold out for the first time.”
“A rhapsody of total appreciation and awe at a virtuoso performance like Augusta has never seen.” — Jim Nantz
It was the primary of what would grow to be 15 wins in main tournaments by Woods, his assault on Jack Nicklaus’ record 18 main titles thwarted by a sequence of non-public scandals and accidents in later years.
“Woods’ win happened half his life ago, but the roars it triggered will never fade,” Masters.com wrote in 2017, in a Twentieth-anniversary retrospective of the landmark second in international sports activities historical past.
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“Today … most of us remember the winning moment as if it just happened. Tiger shook the golf world.”
For extra Lifestyle articles, go to www.foxnews.com/way of life.
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