John Oda knows how to make a good first impression

John Oda sure knows how to make a quick impact.

From his first visit to the University of Nevada-Las Vegas to his first two events of the 2019 Web.com Tour season, the native of Hawaii isn’t one to take his time making a good first impression.

JC Deacon, who was the assistant coach at UNLV at the time of recruiting Oda – and is now the head coach at the University of Florida – admits when he began coaching, he knew nothing of recruiting. He says he was naive. He didn’t know what to expect. At his first U.S. Junior Amateur in 2012, he was just wandering around.

He was tasked to try to put UNLV back on the golfing map, and he stumbled upon Oda’s group only to watch the small guy pack a big punch.

He watched Oda for his final nine holes and after seeing he was from Hawaii, he thought there might be a shot at him – given how close Las Vegas is to Hawaii relative to other big Division I schools.

“UNLV Golf? I had never heard of it,” Oda recalls with a laugh. “I wanted to go to (the University of California) or Oregon or (Arizona State University). I visited and I saw Shadow Creek, Southern Highlands, the alums, and I was like, ‘holy cow, I want to be here.’”

Deacon’s efforts worked out in spades. He visited Hawaii a lot while recruiting Oda (“I probably stalked John more than he would have liked”) to watch him play and he bared witness to Oda putting on a “ball-striking clinic” most weeks. He 100 percent was sold, he says.

The pair meshed well and Deacon says he was impressed when Oda came for a visit – alone as a 15-year-old – in nice slacks, a button-up shirt, and a sport coat. They didn’t visit Las Vegas’ Strip; Oda instead introduced Deacon to the Vietnamese soup dish, pho, and the two talked golf. A pair of “golf geeks,” says Deacon.

Oda saw the facilities – Southern Highlands and Shadow Creek have long been considered some of the best courses in the world – and he was sold.

Deacon admits it was the longtime assistant golf coach at the University of Georgia who told him once you find a guy you want on your team, you go everywhere to get him. Make sure you show him you want him more than anyone else, Deacon recalls.

“When he called and committed to UNLV, I went running to Coach (Dwaine Knight) and I said, ‘Coach, I just got my first All-American’ and he thought I was dead crazy,” says Deacon. “But sure enough, John proved me right.”

Once school wrapped up – Oda left UNLV prior to his senior year and turned professional at 21 after fulfilling the prophesy from Deacon: he was an All-American all three of his seasons at UNLV – he started to try to Monday Qualify for PGA TOUR events. This came after he qualified for the 2017 U.S. Open and realized how his game was stacking up to the best in the world.

Oda notched an eight-place finish at the 2017 OHL Classic at Mayakoba before playing three Mackenzie Tour-PGA TOUR Canada events in 2018 – with two top-10 finishes. He played four more PGA TOUR events in the summer before finishing third at the Barracuda Championship and T-11 at the Wyndham Championship to get him into Web.com Tour Finals.

On paper, Oda says, things were looking great going into that four-tournament stretch. But he said he put a lot of pressure on himself to get his TOUR card and missed three of four cuts.

“Thinking ahead took my focus away from what got me the good results – just focusing on the process and focusing on preparing and doing the things I could control. I got ahead of myself, started thinking a little too far, and put too much pressure on myself,” he admits. “Ultimately I stressed myself out a little bit.”

Oda started the Web.com Tour season with back-to-back T-4 results in the Bahamas, and is delicately perched at the 25th spot on The 25. He was happy to get going with some solid momentum at the beginning of the year and improve on his eight-guaranteed-start status. Now he’s got eyes on the next stage in the journey, but not without some learning first.

The travel, he says, has been the biggest thing he’s tried to cope with so far this year. In 2018, while he was trying to Monday Qualify for PGA TOUR events, he would play the Monday Qualifier and if he got in, 18 holes on Tuesday, and practice on Wednesday. Now he’s in every Web.com Tour event, so he has Monday and Tuesday open, plus he plays the pro-am on Wednesdays.

“I’m thinking about how I’m strategically going about my week to conserve energy for 3-4 weeks on the road,” he says. “That’s been a good learning for me.”

He’s also been learning to go home to Las Vegas to rest – a city and descriptor that are not usually paired.

Oda made numerous relationships in the golf community in Las Vegas during his time at school, and watched the city evolve into a hub for young professionals. Everyone, he says, wanted to go to Phoenix and Las Vegas sat almost vacant before a handful of younger guys started to make a move there. Aaron Wise, Wyndham Clark, Doug Ghim, Maverick McNealy, Norman Xiong are some who call Las Vegas home along with TOUR veterans Scott Piercy, Ryan Moore, and Kevin Na, as well as LPGA Tour stars Danielle Kang and Inbee Park. Oda says it’s a great spot to be, although, with a laugh, he says it’s starting to get a little overcrowded.

“It fits the model for the kind of place for a young, aspiring TOUR pro,” he says.

While he’ll occasionally visit The Strip for dinner and is a newly made hockey fan (although he hasn’t gone to a Vegas Golden Knights game yet), he’s happy to live a stay-at-home-with-the-guys kind of life… even in Las Vegas.

And whether it was a quick start to his collegiate career, a fast start to this season on the Web.com Tour, or a great first impression as a teenager, Oda is taking it all in as his professional golf career gets underway, with a bright future ahead – just ask the guy who discovered him.

“He had the talent,” says Deacon, “but when you look at the way he thought about things and went about his business, there was just no way he wasn’t going to be successful.”