CHASKA, Minn. -- Michael Jordan was on the course watching the golfer named after him, Jordan Spieth, and his partner, Patrick Reed, and there was no doubting the identity of the biggest American star in the field. The Ryder Cup fans were falling over themselves as they reached across the ropes to touch Jordan, get his attention and ask him if he thought the United States would finally win.
Jordan was dressed in a Team USA sweat suit. He had a smoldering cigar in his hand and an all-business look on his face as he stood beside a police officer and silently watched the Americans tee off. He didn't offer much more than a few nods, a few hellos and a concession to someone he recognized and might owe a few dollars from a bygone golf game. (True story.) But really, what was there for the greatest closer of all time to say?
Jordan went six-for-six in the NBA Finals and six-for-six in the chase to be named NBA Finals MVP, and you know deep down that the world's most recognizable golf fan wonders why the U.S. never seems to have the mental toughness to put away the Europeans. You know deep down that Michael Jordan wishes he could do more than stare down Ian Poulter (and wag his finger at him) the way he did at Medinah in 2012 and wishes he had the tee-to-green talent to do to Rory McIlroy what he used to do to the Knicks.
However, the fact that Jordan won't be suiting up for his fellow North Carolina Tar Heel, Davis Love III, when this Ryder Cup is decided Sunday shouldn't make any difference in the outcome. Love is on record as saying he is coaching, or captaining, "the best golf team, maybe, ever assembled."
If that is a debatable claim, this one isn't: Love has the better team at Hazeltine. He has a better team that has a 9½ to 6½ lead going into the final session. He has a better team playing a home game in front of a Minnesota crowd that has sounded every bit as hostile as a Red Sox-Yankees crowd at Fenway Park.
Oh, and Love also has in Reed a lion who is roaring just as loudly as McIlroy on the other side.
The Americans have no excuses to not win the Ryder Cup for the first time since 2008 and for only the third time in their past 11 attempts. They have no good reason to choke the way they did for Love at Medinah, where they blew a 10-6 lead with some synchronized gagging down the stretch.
They have a dozen singles matches to play against an inferior European team that includes a spooked Danny Willett and five other rookies, a completely fried Lee Westwood and Martin Kaymer (a combined 0-5 at Hazeltine), and the old terminator, Poulter, in the benign role of vice captain.
Even if McIlroy beats Reed in perhaps the greatest opening act in Ryder Cup history, the Americans should win six of those duels just by showing up. Dustin Johnson should take Chris Wood, Brooks Koepka should take Willett, Matt Kuchar should take Kaymer, Ryan Moore should take Westwood, Brandt Snedeker should take Andy Sullivan, and Zach Johnson should take Matthew Fitzpatrick. The Americans can lose one of those matches and the other five (four of them featuring heavyweights Spieth, Phil Mickelson, Rickie Fowler and Jimmy Walker) and still end up with enough points to prevail.
"They have all done what I've asked them to do incredibly well," Love said of his players. "They are all confident. They all want to play."
Although Love gambled correctly Saturday afternoon that Mickelson would overcome his erratic driving and wisely listened to Tiger Woods' advice to play Reed and Spieth for a fourth straight session (what a disaster that benching would've been!), he made one mistake that did not come back to hurt him.
Just as he benched his hot team, Mickelson and Keegan Bradley, before the meltdown at Medinah, Love sat Snedeker on Saturday afternoon after the Snedeker-Koepka tandem went 2-0 and was the only American team to win Friday afternoon. The U.S. captain handed in his afternoon pairings before Snedeker and Koepka's morning victory over Henrik Stenson and Fitzpatrick was complete, but the Americans never trailed in their match, and Snedeker was on fire, celebrating his made putts with fury like McIlroy's and Reed's.
The Europeans never seem to rest their hot hands. Five of their players will go the full five matches; only two Americans will do the same. The Europeans never seem to let up.
But the two leading candidates to sit for Snedeker, Moore and J.B. Holmes, won their match with Westwood and Willett. Mickelson and Kuchar did some goofy, middle-aged, happy dance at Kaymer's and Sergio Garcia's expense, and Love's guys won three of four points in the afternoon.
None came up bigger than the young rebel who loves to dress himself in Tiger Woods red. Teamed with the higher profile Texan, Spieth, Reed survived their calamitous finish in a morning draw with Garcia and Rafa Cabrera Bello to put on a fireworks show in the afternoon by pummeling Justin Rose and Stenson with a flurry of birdies and a hole-out eagle.
As amazing as that was, Reed's show did not make a buyer of every European visitor in the stands. On the ninth hole, with a man dressed as Captain America leading the cheers, one Garcia supporter shouted at the home fans, "Remember Medinah. Remember Medinah."
If Love needed more reminder of what went down in 2012, he got it Saturday night.
"We're closer than we were at Medinah," said Rose, one of the heroes of that day. The Englishman would predict, "It's our turn tomorrow. We're going to come out strong."
Recent history says the Americans fear that this ballgame isn't over. That is, recent history and the presence of McIlroy, who has all of Poulter's rage and guts and 20 times the talent. By playing a pro wrestling heel in Gorgeous George form, McIlroy has turned his battle with the Hazeltine crowd into a steel cage match. On Sunday, only one combatant will come out alive.
Love's players should be the last men standing. The U.S. has a 3-point lead, home-field advantage, superior talent and a closer in Reed who has a Jordan-esque flair for the moment.
For Love, even without former schoolmate Michael Jordan to take the ball, this should be tantamount to a slam dunk on Dean Smith's court. The best golf team (maybe) ever assembled has no business losing this Ryder Cup to a beaten-down European group that looks in desperate need of a Caribbean cruise.
On Sunday, Love will tell his players to keep doing what they're doing and have a whole lot of fun. But if the American captain were on truth serum for his final pregame meeting with his players, his most appropriate advice would be reduced to two words:
Don't choke.