The dawnâ€s early light broke slow and heavy Friday over Bethpage State Park, a pale wash creeping through the trees as if reluctant to reveal the chaos already under way. Fans clad in red, white and blue had been congregating outside since 3am, trotting down floodlit paths to the 1st-tee grandstand when the gates finally swung open at 5am. By 6am, thousands were already wedged together in the dark, swaying to chants and clutching cardboard cups of coffee, tallboys of hard seltzer and greasy breakfast cheeseburgers.
When the clock ticked toward the 7.10am start time, the atmosphere boiled over in the 5,000-seat amphitheater. The chants ricocheted around the stands: “We want Bryson! We want Bryson!†Some wore DeChambeauâ€s name scrawled across their bare chests while others waved handwritten signs. Their wish was his command. Bryson DeChambeau, golfâ€s most polarizing showman, emerged with Justin Thomas by his side. They strode through the tunnel shoulder to shoulder, an American flag draped across their backs, DeChambeau pounding his chest as if priming for combat. Across from them waited Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton, the Spanish-English duo clad in Europeâ€s blue and gold, Rahm already stone-faced, Hatton muttering to himself.
A flyover of military jets rattled the sky. Security helicopters hovered above in anticipation of Donald Trumpâ€s arrival later in the day. Those who hadnâ€t made plans to arrive hours early were stuck in the residential streets outside the grounds in scenes resembling World War Z. On the grandstand video board, Rory McIlroy appeared, warming up on the range, drawing jeers and obscenities. As Keegan Bradley, the rookie US captain, barked into a microphone minutes earlier – “Letâ€s fucking go, boys!†– this was not golf as country club pastime. This was the bloodsport the masses were promised.
DeChambeau had teased the possibility the day before: the 397-yard opening hole was “definitely drivable†downwind, he said, if you could carry 200mph of ball speed. Rahm promptly missed right into the rough to sarcastic roars. Then DeChambeau turned to face the crowd, took two violent practice swings, then smacked a drive into the New York morning. It bounded down to 10 yards short of the green. Promises made, promises kept. Thomas pitched to 16ft. DeChambeau buried the putt. One up after one. A thunderclap of noise, a fist pump from Thomas, a barbaric yawp from DeChambeau. The crowd nearly shook the stands apart. America had landed its opening punch, just what Bradley wanted from his fiery leaders.
For a moment, it seemed a tone was set. The Ryder Cup was back on home soil, the US determined to avenge Rome, the crowd primed to explode with every red numeral on the board. But the wave never built. The course, softened by rain, played toothless. Europe absorbed the opening haymaker and struck back with prejudice. By the turn, the blue numbers began to bleed across the giant leaderboards. Rahm and Hatton steadied, clawing back. Scottie Scheffler and Russell Henley sputtered against Ludvig Åberg and Matt Fitzpatrick. McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood silenced Collin Morikawa and Harris English with cool precision. The sound inside the amphitheater and around the grounds dimmed, chants turning flat, one side starting “U-S-A!†while the other trailed off.
The knockout came at the par-four 7th, where Xander Schauffele tugged his drive into the rough left. From there, he and Patrick Cantlay stumbled, Cantlay missing another tentative putt from nine feet, failing to save par. The last flicker of red vanished from the board. The partisan crowd, primed for pandemonium, sagged into uneasy silence. It was around now that Air Force One lifted off from Joint Base Andrews, bound for Farmingdale. You wondered if Trump, peering at a leaderboard update on the flight deck and tethered to an exhaustively documented aversion for losers, considered turning the plane back.
Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton congratulate each other on a productive first morningâ€s work. Photograph: David Davies/PA
By the finish, the wreckage was clear. Rahm and Hatton closed out DeChambeau and Thomas 4&3, a rout disguised by that opening birdie. McIlroy and Fleetwood overwhelmed Morikawa and English 5&4. Åberg and Fitzpatrick battered Scheffler and Henley 5&3. Only Schauffele and Cantlay salvaged a point, holding off Viktor Hovland and Robert MacIntyre to escape with a two-up win that prevented the first away-team sweep of any session since 1987. The scoreboard read 3–1 to Europe, the Long Island cauldron quieted.
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By lunchtime, the carnival had dulled. The United States, needing a fast start to rattle Europe, had been rattled themselves. DeChambeauâ€s opening blast still echoed – an act of theater as brash as his personality – but the American party was muted. Every Ryder Cup insists on being louder and rowdier than the last. Bethpage certainly sounded like it in the opening minutes, when the ground shook under 5,000 stamping feet and DeChambeau nearly drove the green. But memory has a way of being selective. For the fans who had turned up at three in the morning, the image that may linger is the uneasy hush that followed, when the bravado slipped and the Europeans seized control.
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