ROME — The U.S. is falling in Rome.

So far.

The Europeans got off to a dream start in the first session at the 44^th Ryder Cup on Friday morning at Marco Simone Golf and Country Club, storming to a 4-0 lead after the foursomes (alternate shot) session.

Nearly everything the Europeans did worked and seemingly nothing went the way of the USA.

The Europeans won 22 holes in the foursomes to a mere 10 for the Americans, who never held a lead in any of the matches.

It was the first time since 1989 — when the U.S. team rallied to tie in the end — the Americans played an entire session without leading for at least one hole in any match.

It was only the fourth time in Ryder Cup history that a team began the competition by sweeping a session 4-0.

Each of those times came with the U.S. winning foursomes and each time, the U.S went on to win the Ryder Cup.

The first U.S. pairing to lose was Scottie Scheffler, the No. 1 ranked player in the world, and Sam Burns, who was playing in his first Ryder Cup. They were waxed by Jon Rahm, the world No. 2, and Tyrrell Hatton, 4-and-3.

“We played as confidently as two people can play,’’ Rahm said. “It was a beautiful morning. I told Tyrrell, usually the feelings you have down the stretch in a tournament I had hitting my first warm-up put at 6:20 in the morning in the dark, and it increasingly got higher until we hit that tee shot on the first hole. 

“It’s a different feeling, but if you embrace and enjoy it, you can play some pretty good rounds of golf like we did today.’’

You could say that first match was a tone-setter for Europe, but the Europeans were setting tones in all four of their matches.

Max Homa and Brian Harman, two U.S. Ryder Cup rookies who were somewhat controversially sent out in the second match considering U.S. captain Zach Johnson left veterans Brooks Koepka, Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas on the sideline for morning session, were similarly dominated by Viktor Hovland and Ludvig Aberg, 4-and-3.

The bloodbath got messier for the Americans when Shane Lowry and Sepp Straka dusted Rickie Fowler and Collin Morikawa, 2-and-1 to take a 3-0 lead

Then, in the final morning match, the U.S. pairing that was nearly flawless in 2021 at Whistling Straits, Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele, lost to Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood, 2-and-1 to complete the morning whitewash.

The European anchor of “Fleetwood Mac’’ put a cap on the morning session proceedings, which was a killer for the Americans, who were desperately trying to put something on the board before the morning was finished.

“It’s been an unbelievable session,’’ McIlroy said. “All week, all we talked about was getting off to fast starts, playing little three-hole hole matches. We were ready to go from the first tee shot as you could see.’’

Considering Cantlay and Schauffele were 2-0 playing together in foursomes two years ago at the Ryder Cup and 5-0 including Presidents Cup play, Johnson had to figure he was going to get some red on the board out of that anchor pairing.

Not to be.

That left the U.S. in DEFCON desperation mode in the afternoon four-ball (best ball) session with hopes of staving off embarrassment.

The afternoon pairings for four-balls began with Spieth and Thomas playing Hovland and Hatton, Scheffler and Koepka playing Rahm and Nicolai Hojgaard, Homa and Wyndham Clark playing Justin Rose and Robert MacIntyre and Morikawa and Schauffele playing McIlroy and Matthew Fitzpatrick.

That left Fowler, Cantlay, Harman and Burns sitting on Friday afternoon and, for Europe, Fleetwood, Aberg, Lowry and Straka on the sideline until Saturday.

Three U.S. players found water hazards in the morning round, and the Americans failed to make any big putts.

Europe was boosted by a chip-in for birdie on the first hole by Hovland that gave the Europeans their first lead of the day and they never looked back.

“Amazing to sweep a session,’’ McIlroy said. “I can’t remember the last time Europe has done that. We can’t get complacent at all. This is an unbelievably long American Team. Last week the American girls went up 4-0 in the first session (of the Solheim Cup) and Europe were able to come back, so we are not taking anything for granted here. It’s a great start but we need to keep our foot on the pedal and keep winning points.’’