By
Brentley Romine
On September 12, 2023, 5:16pm EDT
Some of the brightest stars in golf history playing not just on one of the game’s biggest stages but also on one of the greatest golf courses in the world?
That was the 1973 Ryder Cup at Muirfield, where a U.S. Team led by Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and captain Jack Burke Jr. came back from an early deficit to blow the doors off its competition entirely with a record-tying singles performance. While basking in his squad’s triumph, Burke proclaimed his squad as “the most unbelievable golf players our country has ever produced.” At the time, who could argue?
Now, 50 years later, here’s a look back on that significant and eventful 1973 Ryder Cup, from the key players to the pivotal moments that ultimately led to a 19-13 American victory:
The Scene
When it comes to hosting Open Championships, Scotland is the runaway leader, having hosted the sport’s oldest major championship 97 times. But as far as Ryder Cups go, the country has seen just two played within its borders, 1973 and more recently the 2014 matches at Gleneagles. Muirfield’s staging of the first Ryder Cup on Scottish soil coincided with a minor tweak to the format, with foursomes and four-ball matches being split over the first two days after the five previous editions saw all eight foursomes matches contested the first day followed by all eight four-ball matches the second day.
Burke was serving a second stint as U.S. Captain after he was a playing captain 16 years earlier at Lindrick Golf Club in Nottinghamshire, England. Burke went 1-1 at that 1957 Ryder Cup, which the Americans lost by three points, becoming just the third U.S. squad – and the first since 1933 – to suffer defeat. So, one could say the 50-year-old Burke was itching to get his revenge as he led a group of all-stars into Muirfield.
The Americans’ opposition, officially called Great Britain and Ireland for the first time, was captained by Bernard Hunt, a 43-year-old, eight-time Ryder Cupper who would also captain the following Ryder Cup at Laurel Valley. Hunt bit on an Arnold Palmer declaration prior to the matches starting, responding to reporters, “Palmer says he will be surprised if the Americans don't win. Well, I can say I'd be surprised if they don't lose.”
The Stars
Due to a PGA of America rule at the time, players with fewer than five years of professional-golf experience were not eligible to play for the U.S. Team, which meant that Johnny Miller, the reigning U.S. Open champion, was ineligible, as well as Lanny Wadkins, who went on to play eight Ryder Cups.
But the 12-man American squad was still loaded with future Hall of Famers, including Lee Trevino, Billy Casper, rookie Tom Weiskopf, Nicklaus and Palmer, who at 44 years old was playing in his fifth and final Ryder Cup.
Hunt had half as many rookies on his team (two to the Americans’ four) while his standouts were Englishmen Tony Jacklin and Peter Oosterhuis, Scotland’s Bernard Gallacher, and 10-time Ryder Cupper Christy O’Connor Sr., the 48-year-old Irishman who like Palmer would also see his Ryder Cup playing career end at Muirfield. The GB&I skipper, however, wasn’t too confident in his side as it prepared to face the heavily-favored Americans.
“They're independent, and this morning they reported for breakfast wearing the wrong outfits,” Hunt told reporters during one of the practice days. “They have a chart specifying which color sweater to wear with which pair of trousers each day. I had to send most of them back to their rooms to change because the color combinations were wrong. But I don't mind if they appear in their undershirts and shorts if they can go on shooting 61, 62 or 63.”
Speaking of 61, O’Connor carded such a score on the first official practice day, prompting Palmer to sound off to the press, “I'm not too much interested. I don't think you will see any fantastic low scores once the matches start.”
Photo Credit: Getty Images
The Turning Point
Despite entering the matches as a massive underdog, Great Britain and Ireland built a 5.5-2.5 lead after the first two sessions behind two wins from the only Scots in the squad, Gallacher and Brian Barnes, who beat Trevino and Casper in foursomes before routing Tommy Aaron and Gay Brewer in four-ball, 5 and 4. England’s Maurice Bembridge and Eddie Polland were waxed by Nicklaus and Palmer in foursomes, 6 and 5, before Wales’ Brian Huggett replaced Polland, who had recently become a father, for four-ball, and Huggett and Bembridge got the better of Nicklaus and Palmer for one of three afternoon points for the home team.
“I think the thing that welded this team together was that we got beat so bad on the first day," Burke would later admit. “They were fragmented until then, and that pulled them together.”
Gallacher awoke Friday morning with a stomach bug, and after a 2-0 day he sat out both second-day sessions. England’s Peter Butler, who didn’t play the first day, rolled out of bed less than two hours before his morning foursomes match and would drop both of his matches, though he did produce one of the week’s highlights by recording the first hole-in-one in Ryder Cup history in a 1-up foursomes loss to Nicklaus and Weiskopf – Butler holed a 3-iron from 188 yards at Muirfield’s 16th hole. Nicklaus and Weiskopf would also win their four-ball match together as the Americans took 3.5 four-ball points to knot the score up at 8-8 heading into Saturday’s 16 singles matches.
Nicklaus and Weiskopf’s 3-and-2 four-ball win over Polland and Clive Clark produced one of the better teammate exchanges:
Nicklaus: “Rack your cue.”
Weiskopf: “What do you mean?”
Nicklaus: “Pick up your coin.”
Weiskopf: “Oh, you want me to move it?”
Nicklaus: “No, I mean pick it up. I’m not going to miss this putt.”
The Result
With then-U.K. Prime Minister Edward Heath in attendance, and Palmer sitting out Saturday morning’s eight-match singles session, Great Britain and Ireland still clung to a fair amount of hope at the start of the final day. But the Americans quickly chipped away at that home confidence, taking each of the first three singles points with wins by Casper, Weiskopf and Homero Blancas, who beat Barnes, Gallacher and Butler, respectively, with none of those matches reaching No. 18.
Any remaining GB&I chance of victory was evaporated shortly after as the U.S. took 11 of the possible 16 singles points – tying a record that likely won’t be broken as long as there are just 12 singles matches – and only dropping three matchups, including Palmer’s final Ryder Cup match, which he lost to Oosterhuis, 4 and 2, to cap his career individual record at 22-8-2.
J.C. Snead, nephew of Sam, would secure the clinching point as the Americans retained the Cup for an eighth straight match – the U.S. would go on to win five more before Team Europe won the 1985 Ryder Cup at The Belfry.
“The British players were real good,” Burke said of the comeback win, “but when you face that much power, it finally gets to you.”
The Legacy
While the Americans’ 1973 rally was just the latest in a string of lopsided victories, it certainly played a role in the expanding of the Great Britain and Ireland side just three Ryder Cups later to include all of continental Europe as well.
If you consider this bit from Glasgow Herald columnist Raymond Jacobs, it’s easy to see why the move was made: “Long ago the realization must have dawned that the match was an exhibition of skills, not a contest between equals.” Jacobs also called for the four-ball format to be dropped from the program – “So long as 32 points are at stake and a British captain has to juggle with 12 players over three days, an American victory is inevitable.” Fifty years later, Jacobs, who died in 2016, hasn’t gotten that wish, though the total points did get reduced from 32 to 28 for Europe’s big debut in 1979.
The 1973 U.S. Ryder Cup Team, which had five players – Nicklaus, Trevino, Casper, Weiskopf and Snead – earn at least three points, is still considered one of the strongest American sides in history – and it’s the last U.S. Team that featured both Nicklaus and Palmer. Nicklaus led the way with 4.5 points while Palmer, who would captain the 1975 American squad, closed his playing career with a 2-3 week.
