In the second round of the 2025 Masters Tournament at Augusta National, Justin Rose maintained his lead, finishing at 8-under par with a 1-under 71, despite a less dominant performance compared to his opening 65. Bryson DeChambeau closed the gap, shooting a 68 to sit one stroke back at 7-under. Rory McIlroy made a strong comeback after a shaky first round, carding a bogey-free 6-under 66—the day’s lowest score—placing him at 6-under, tied with Corey Conners for third. Defending champion Scottie Scheffler scored a 71, landing at 5-under, tied with Shane Lowry, Matt McCarty, and Tyrrell Hatton. The leaderboard tightened, with seven players within three shots of Rose, setting up an intense weekend.
Max Homa made the cut with a 2-under round, defying expectations after a poor run of form. Veterans Bernhard Langer, Fred Couples, and Phil Mickelson missed the cut, with Langer, at 67, ending his final Masters one shot shy. The cut line was set at 2-over, and all five amateurs failed to advance.
VSiN’s golf experts offered their second-round observations and third-round predictions . . .
Wes Reynolds
Poison once sang “Every Rose Has It’s Thorn”. Well, the thorn for Justin Rose on Friday was his approach play as he lost a little over a shot to the field. However, he gained two more strokes with the putter (now at almost +7.5 through 36 holes) and still holds the lead going into the weekend at the Masters.
Rose (+750), 8-under, leads by one stroke over Bryson DeChambeau (+330). DeChambeau, the 2024 U.S. Open champion, gained five strokes with his short game on Friday and he shares a co-favorite role with the man he defeated last summer at Pinehurst No. 2, Rory McIlroy (+330).
McIlroy gave four strokes back in the final four holes on Thursday but showed resiliency on Friday shooting the low round of the day, a bogey-free 6-under 66, despite only hitting half of his fairways. He will be in the penultimate pairing with Canadian Corey Conners (12/1), who ranks second in the field for both Driving Accuracy and Greens In Regulation. While lacking major championship pedigree, Conners has finished inside the Top 10 three times here at Augusta National.
Scottie Scheffler (+360) went bogey-free on Thursday but carded five bogeys on Friday including at the finishing hole. Nevertheless, he still shot an under-par round and is firmly in the mix to defend his green jacket, which has not happened since Tiger Woods did so in 2002.
Joining Scheffler at 5-under are Tyrrell Hatton (20/1), who carded bogeys on two of his last three holes, Shane Lowry (16/1), and Matt McCarty (80/1), who had one bettor give Circa Sports an over $2 million liability with a pre-tournament bet at 775/1 odds.
On the periphery of contention are Viktor Hovland (28/1), Jason Day (35/1), and Rasmus Højgaard (75/1) at 4-under, plus Collin Morikawa (19/1), Ludvig Åberg (28/1), 2021 Masters champion Hideki Matsuyama (35/1), 2018 Masters champion Patrick Reed (80/1), and Sungjae Im (90/1), all at 3-under.
If you are a believer in ball-striking, and I typically am, then Rory McIlroy would be your choice to take home the green jacket on Sunday. McIlroy leads the field gaining 7.6 combined strokes off the tee and with approach shots. He was finally going to get off to a good start and then the wheels came off. He rebounded strongly on Friday, and we will see if his ball striking can overcome Rose and DeChambeau’s respective short games and Scheffler’s Augusta pedigree having won two of the last three here.
Oftentimes timing is everything in sports betting. My timing on Thursday was not exactly impeccable, adding McIlroy at 4/1 early on in his back nine. So, I have a bad number on him and certainly not as good of one as my Long Shots colleagues Matt Brown and Kelley Bydlon, who bet him pre-tournament, but we are clearly all rooting for Rory to finally complete the career Grand Slam.
Matt Brown
UNDERTAKER DOT GIF! Rory McIllroy back from the dead with the best round of the day, 6-under 66. My bankroll would certainly appreciate another banger on Saturday, but we are nice and sweaty with…
Outright tickets on Corey Conners, Shane Lowry, and Hideki Matsuyama (made a couple months ago) who managed to shoot 4-under despite losing 1.85 strokes putting. I didn’t like Hideki’s form coming into the tournament, but he was a guy we talked about that might be able to show up and just find it.
Dechambeau, Hatton, Schefler, Hovland, Day, Morikawa, Sungjae, Pat Reed, and Ludvig all within striking distance is going to make for a fantastic weekend.
Sure, I’ve got the good tickets in the account, but let’s talk about the bad ones. I was WAY too high on Sepp Straka who was just overwhelmed at Augusta this year. He was riding such a heater, but lost putting, ARG, OTT, and T2G over his two days en route to getting cut at +5.
Also had too much confidence in Bob MacIntyre. He put together two forgettable rounds, losing nearly two strokes both putting and approach. That’s not going to get you very far at Augusta National.
Round 2 Notes:
– The course is still favoring accuracy off the tee as opposed to distance. DataGolf has this as “strongly favoring” the straight hitters. Of note Collin Morikawa (4th), Daniel Berger (12th), Matt McCarty (17th), Sungjae Im (22nd), and Corey Conners (25th) all rank inside the top 25 in driving accuracy on the tour this season.
– If I didn’t already have a ticket, a Corey Conners live Top 5 at plus money looks enticing.
– Justin Rose is a massive dog to Bryson DeChambeau in round 3. He’s a dog for sure, but the price is approaching a level where you play it on principle.
Kelley Bydlon
Well, the story of the day yesterday was Rory McIlroy, and it is again today, but for different reasons. Rory shot a brilliant six-under-66 today to put himself right back into the mix for the weekend.
Everyone is still chasing Justin Rose, but he has some big names chasing him, including major champs McIlroy, Scottie Scheffler, Shane Lowry, and Bryson DeChambeau. DeChambeau had another great round today and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s slipping on a green jacket come Sunday. Hopefully not though…
No added bets for me heading into the weekend yet. I’ll add any third round matchups at vsin.com. I do think Hideki Matsuyama could be worth a look in third round matchups. Other than that, I’ll be rooting for one of the Irishmen to get home!
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