The Masters - April 13, 2008

Augusta National Golf Club-Augusta, Georgia USA

Event Information

For the second year in a row, we have a Masters champion who didn't seem to have the credentials to win such a prestigious tournament. Last year, it was Zach Johnson, who had won only a single PGA Tour event before his victory at Augusta National. Now, it is Immelman, also a winner of just one title before Sunday, looking as though he was made to wear a green jacket.

Immelman slept on the lead for three nights, something not accomplished by a champion here since Seve Ballesteros in 1980. Immelman, a 28-year-old with a polished swing, who finally realized his potential in the wicked wind of Augusta and a final round that yielded only four rounds under par.

Immelman certainly had a fine résumé. After last year's Wachovia Championship on the PGA Tour, he had risen to No. 12 in the Official World Golf Ranking. He was coming off a 2006 rookie of the year season, when he won the Western Open. And he had won three European Tour titles.

Immelman is the sixth player since 1997 to win his first major at The Masters, but that list includes Woods, Mark O'Meara, Mike Weir and Phil Mickelson, all of whom built a reputation before winning at Augusta National.

And he joins a long list of surprise major championship winners, especially in recent years.

Johnson had missed the cut in his previous three majors and never had finished better than a tie for 17th. Ben Curtis won the British Open and Shaun Micheel the PGA Championship in 2003. Neither had won a PGA Tour event before those victories. Todd Hamilton, a 38-year-old rookie in 2004, won the British Open in a playoff over Ernie Els, his second victory of the year. Since then, he has missed the cut in nine majors.

First Major A Masters

Trevor Immelman is the sixth player in the past 11 years to make The Masters his first major.

Year Name
2008 Trevor Immelman
2007 Zach Johnson
2004 Phil Mickelson
2003 Mike Weir
1998 Mark O'Meara
1997 Tiger Woods

The Masters - April 02-08, 2007

Augusta National Golf Club-Augusta, Georgia USA

Event Information

Zach Johnson stood under a brilliant blue sky on a cool Easter Sunday, amazing golf glory mere moments from certainty, and softly whispered "I love you" in the ear of his infant son, resting warmly, peacefully in the arms of wife Kim.

All heaven was in his hands.

Calm and genial but hardly the iconic, charismatic bomber on which Augusta National Golf Club has built its fabled lore, Johnson on Sunday completed a 71st Masters tournament that was atypical in every way imaginable, right down to its unlikely champion.

The Masters - April 06-09, 2006

Augusta National Golf Club-Augusta, Georgia USA

Event Information

Phil Mickelson broke free of a pack full of most of the greatest players of the modern era on the back nine at Augusta National to win the 70th Masters. Mickelson earned his second Masters title in three years, and his third major in the last nine.

Phil Mickelson is the 16th straight Masters winner to come out of the final pairing on Sunday.

(Photo: Getty Images)

The Masters - April 07-10, 2005

Augusta National Golf Club-Augusta, Georgia USA

Event Information

Four Masters now for Tiger Woods, four green jackets, equaling the number won by the incomparable Arnold Palmer, moving up on the number, six, won by Nicklaus, who not so long ago in a burst of admiration, blithely predicted Tiger would win 10 of them.

Tiger Woods added a fourth green jacket to his wardrobe and secured a spot in the 2005 PGA Grand Slam of Golf

Augusta National Golf Club-Augusta, Georgia USA

Event Information

For phil Mickelson it came down to an 18-foot putt Sunday, to win his first major championship.

Mickelson had been grown weary of watching other players win the green Jacket as he stood to the side. This time he would not let his chance slip away, a birdie putt that kept him in suspense to the very end. It rolled toward the cup, swirled around the left edge and dropped in.

Mickelson leapt as high as he could and threw both arms in the air, kissed the ball that he plucked from the cup and tossed it into a delirious crowd that felt the same way.

After his long wait for a major championship, Phil Mickelson deserved to do a little jumping
after sinking that birdie on 18.