How Europe was able to back up Rory McIlroy’s words and win on the

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — Rory McIlroy was nowhere to be found.

Two years after he had called his shot and predicted a win at Bethpage Black, Shane Lowry’s birdie putt on the 18th green Sunday transformed McIlroy’s comments from confident to prophetic. The celebration, however, had started without him.

A gleeful Lowry bounced to the tune of a heavily European crowd that serenaded him with chants. Jon Rahm hugged fellow Spaniard and vice captain José María Olazábal — captain of the last team to win a road cup in 2012 — who cried on his shoulder. European captain Luke Donald was finally able to exhale.

McIlroy had lost his blockbuster singles match against Scottie Scheffler 1-down and for a moment, the chance of being on the wrong end of the biggest collapse in Ryder Cup history appeared plausible. Down 12-5, the United States team had mounted a comeback and made the Ryder Cup as close as everyone thought it could be.

Suddenly, every point mattered. Suddenly, the United States fans had come alive, chanting for their team and cheering on its golfers rather than jeering at the Europeans. Suddenly, McIlroy had to rely on anyone but himself.

“It obviously was really tight there at the end,” McIlroy said. “It was a bit stressful.”

So McIlroy stayed out on the course, bouncing between Tyrrell Hatton’s match and Robert MacIntyre’s, trying to add support with sheer presence alone. Even when Lowry’s putt that retained the cup dropped, he remained out there through the final match that gave Europe victory on a knife’s edge: 15-13.

“It’s nice to be right. I’m not right all the time,” McIlroy said of his prediction. “I think when we won in Rome, the wheels were set in motion to try to do something that had not been done in over a decade. We believed a lot in our continuity.”

Beyond returning 11 of 12 players from Rome, there is a certain cohesion with this…