ESPN Commentary

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- One of the many cool things about the Ryder Cup is that you can get a course radio that carries the broadcasts of both the American and British television coverage.

It's great listening to the Brits, because they can make squeezing a pimple sound like the Battle of Waterloo. Every swing, every gesture, every facial expression is drenched in narrative drama. It's like Lord Tennyson is loose on the course.

So imagine what they've done with this insanely tense competition at Valhalla Golf Club.

Repeat after BBC Radio, in your most urgent English whisper: "Thousands of eyes boring into the back of his head as he bends over this putt! Hoping the ball will be sucked into the hole!"

That was in reference to Jim Furyk on the 18th green. Or maybe it was Ian Poulter. Or Steve Stricker. Or Robert Karlsson. Who didn't have a hold-your-breath-and-feel-your-heart-pound putt on 18 Saturday?

Surrounded by tens of thousands of wired fans in the soft Kentucky twilight, the undulating 18th became drama on parade.

The 547-yard par-5 hole is called "Gahm Over," in honor of club founder Dwight Gahm, whose last name is pronounced "game." But this was not Gahm Over. This was Gahm On, for one more dizzying day.

This was golf so exquisitely exciting that the central nervous system is at risk of overload Sunday, if the competitors can possibly keep up this pace. Nine of 16 matches have come down to the 18th hole thus far, and more last-hole hysteria is expected on the final day.

"I just hope I've got enough left in the tank for tomorrow," Poulter said, "because tomorrow is going to be one hell of a day."

What the hell would you call Saturday?

"Amazing," European captain Nick Faldo offered, and that's as good a word as any.

The afternoon matches began with the Redneck Revival, as small-town Southerners Boo Weekley and J.B. Holmes broke out the whuppin' sticks on Lee Westwood and Soren Hansen. But that match never reached the last hole and ultimately served as the cornbread appetizer for a multicultural main course on 18.

The final three foursomes came to 18 Saturday with their matches on the line. Three times the holes were halved by birdies. Three times one side or the other threw clutch shots into the green to set up pressure-packed putts.

First it was Stricker and Englishman Paul Casey making birdies in succession to halve the match -- Stricker in the hole first from 12 feet, Casey following from 10. For Stricker, it was another in a series of cold-blooded putts. For Casey, it was a chance to redeem a round in which he left partner Sergio Garcia to do most of the heavy lifting.

Then it was Furyk narrowly missing an eagle putt, and allowing Poulter to halve the hole and win the match with a 2-footer after an ice-cold chip from 40 yards. Both those players kept making shots on a back nine in which the Americans made six birdies and the Europeans made five.

Finally, the day ended on a pair of near-miss eagles. Hunter Mahan just pushed his 18-footer past. Karlsson let his 6-footer slide away below the hole.

That halved the match, reduced the afternoon session to a draw and limited the European rally on the day to a single point, 4½ to 3½. And that means the underdog Americans will take a surprising-but-not-reassuring two-point lead into Sunday. The United States is 5½ lousy points away from winning its first Ryder Cup in nine years.

"I can't believe we're ahead," U.S. captain Paul Azinger said. "I'm happy we're ahead. ... Tomorrow is a big day."

Said Faldo: "I believe we're going to win."

Faldo has given his side a chance to win with some managerial decisions that seemed Grady Little-stupid at sunrise Saturday but turned out crazy-like-a-fox crafty by sunset. He benched his two studs, Garcia and Lee Westwood, for the morning foursomes. He sent out the callow team of Henrik Stenson and Oliver Wilson to combat the powerful American tandem of Phil Mickelson and Anthony Kim in the morning as well. And the one guy he's using in all five competitions here is Poulter, widely considered his most questionable captain's pick for the team.

When Faldo concocted a no-Garcia, no-Westwood lineup without any public explanation, this was the Saturday morning response from John Hopkins of the Times of London: "Nick Faldo is off his rocker. He has either gone in the head or his brain has been fried by his rampaging emotions. Or he is inspired. ... It is the most extraordinary decision of the 16 Ryder Cups that I have covered."

You can wind up putting this one in the semi-inspired category. A drained Garcia, who had been sick last week, said he asked out of the morning foursomes for fear of having nothing in the tank come Sunday. He proved an asset in the afternoon, making five birdies in that halved match, and presumably will be ready to fire in the singles matches.

The decision to sit Westwood rested with Faldo, but was affected by Garcia's decision. Faldo said he didn't want to couple Westwood with an unfamiliar playing partner. He also said something about blisters, but the Westwood who was piloting a golf cart around Saturday morning had no Band-Aids on either hand.

Into this forbidding void stepped Englishman Oliver Wilson, a lifetime non-winner as a professional who was so anonymous that my friend and colleague Rick Reilly wondered aloud on this Web site whether he's Faldo's butler. That nearly shot the eyebrows off the forehead of Wilson's mother, Vicki.

"He is Oliver Wilson in his own right," she said, a right proud mum.

Well. The butler did it Saturday.

Wilson, in his first Ryder Cup match, tagged none other than Phil Mickelson with his only loss of this competition by burying a 25-foot birdie putt on 17 and ending their morning foursome 2 and 1.

"The Americans went quiet, and we went ballistic," said his dad, Doug, who took Oliver to the Ryder Cup at The Belfry in 1993 and ignited his passion for golf.

It was a preposterous point for the Euros, one that nobody saw coming beforehand and one that seemed completely out of reach early, when the Mickelson-Kim pairing stormed out to a 4-up lead after six holes.

"Like lambs to the slaughter," opined the Brits on BBC Radio.

Around that time, Faldo drove by in his cart to offer a little pick-me-up to his duo. He informed them that comebacks from 4-down had been accomplished before.

"Must have been a long time ago," came the droll response from the Swedish Stenson.

History repeated itself Saturday, largely because Mickelson and Kim unraveled. They sprayed the ball all over Valhalla, making bogey five times between holes 7 and 15. That helped Mickelson undercut his good work Friday, as he was part of teams that twice blew two-hole advantages on the back nine and earned just half a point. Included in that was a missed 5-foot birdie putt on No. 17 in the afternoon match and a thoroughly bollixed 18th hole that put all the pressure on Mahan to make birdie and halve the hole.

Mickelson's fumbling of the hero's mantle Saturday made room for Poulter, who began the week as The Selection That Should've Been Monty to many Brits but now is more popular than Beckham. He's won three matches outright and will be the only Euro to play all five sessions when he tees it up Sunday.

One thing for sure: He's no longer known for wearing flashy pants. Now he's known for wielding a killer putter under pressure, too.

"It's coming to bed with me tonight," Poulter said of the flat stick.

Good luck getting any sleep, Poults. As they furtively whispered amid the runaway drama on BBC Radio Saturday:

"And this is only the penultimate day!"

Pat Forde is a senior writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at ESPN4D@aol.com.