Steve Nguyen carries more than a scorecard and a lineup sheet when he steps onto the course with his Lakota West High School boys golf team.
He brings years of patience, tidbits from martial arts or finance and a personal belief that the measure of a player lies not in strokes gained but in lessons learned.
Nguyen is in his first official season as head coach of the Firebirds, but he hardly feels like a rookie.
For the last seven years, he quietly served as the junior varsity coach — waiting for his turn — while building relationships with players who are now the core of his varsity lineup.
Nguyen finally got the call he had hoped for. The timing was right. The players were ready. And so was he.
“It’s been unbelievable,” Nguyen said. “This season has been a godsend. It’s something I will never forget. And honestly, it’s because of these kids.”
Nguyen never saw golf as just a technical sport to be taught through drills. A financial advisor by profession and a coach at heart, he has guided young athletes in many other sports.
Each time, though, he’s brought a philosophy centered less on mechanics and more on mentality.
“Some players come to me for golf,” he said. “But what I want them to walk away with is something bigger.
“If they leave being better people, the golf will take care of itself.”
That approach has shown up in unconventional ways.
Instead of marathon range sessions, Nguyen sometimes leads his players through meditation practices under a school shelter. Curious passers-by sometimes stop, confused to see golfers without clubs.
“To me, golf is about intentionality and mindset. That’s what we’re practicing,” Nguyen said.
Nguyen draws on martial arts he studied as a young man. He talks about “alpha” and “theta” brainwaves — teaching his players that peak performance comes from blending disciplined practice with relaxed focus.
He points to Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan as examples — athletes who appeared to operate in a dreamlike state, performing with effortlessness.
“When you’re too reactive, you waste energy,” Nguyen said. “In golf, nothing happens until you swing. The opponent doesn’t do anything to you. You can’t get tackled or blocked. So if you let emotions rule you, you’re giving away your energy for free. Intentionality has everything to do with this game.”
The depth of Nguyen’s coaching style revealed itself in the case of Matthew Krummen, a senior who nearly walked away from golf before his final season.
Krummen had endured tragedy — his father died in a plane crash nearly 10 years ago.
So Nguyen asked him to meet for coffee.
“I told him, ‘I want you to play for you, not for me, not for anybody else,’” Nguyen recalled. “‘This is your senior year. You’ve got your best friends on the team. Don’t let this go without enjoying it. You’ve been through something none of us can understand. That perspective is a gift you can give to them.’”
Both cried during the conversation. Later that night, Krummen texted Nguyen.
“I’m in,” Krummen said.
“He’s been 120 percent in ever since,” Nguyen said with elation. “That’s what makes me proud. He’s playing with joy again. His scores show it, but more importantly, his smile shows it.
“The kid is now a top five golfer in the GMC. Again, I can’t be more proud of that.”
Toku’s crossroads
Senior golfer Toku Fujiwara feels like this season is both a mission and a farewell. He sort of faced a different dilemma.
Fujiwara worried that Nguyen’s style — intense, mental, disciplined — might clash with his own approach.
Fujiwara eventually sat down with Nguyen as well, and the conversation shifted. Nguyen compared his coaching to how he parented his own sons.
“I told him, I’m hard on you because I care. I want you to learn about yourself, not just about golf. That’s what will make you better at Purdue, and better in life.”
“This season, it means a lot,” Fujiwara chimed in. “Anybody who asks, knows it means a lot. As an individual and as a team.”
Fujiwara has been among the Greater Miami Conference’s most reliable players the past three years, posting the best scoring average in the league across back-to-back seasons.
Yet he doesn’t measure success only in numbers. Instead, he’s carrying the weight of unfinished business — chasing a league title and advancing to the state tournament with a team he believes is strong enough to be there.
Last fall ended in heartbreak. Lakota West narrowly missed qualifying for state, and Fujiwara’s inspired play at the GMC tournament wasn’t enough to lift the Firebirds.
“Losing GMCs was huge,” he said. “That was huge. Because I played so good and like, to not win, I felt like I was helpless. But this year, I’ve got a team behind me, and I know we can get it done.”
That sense of redemption is fueling his senior push.
“First, I want to win GMCs. And then obviously I want to make it to state,” Fujiwara said.
For two years, Fujiwara has been the player others circled on the leaderboard. Asked if he feels the bull’s-eye that comes with holding the league’s best average, Fujiwara didn’t hesitate.
“No,” he said before giving junior teammate Griffin Wullenweber a plug. “Right now, obviously Griffin’s got a better average than me, but I trust myself. Obviously I haven’t had the best season, but I kind of go back to what I’ve accomplished. I mean it sounds kind of cocky, but I’ve done a lot in my career. I know my capabilities. … I don’t feel any sort of lack of confidence right now.”
What excites him most, though, is the strength of the team around him. Senior Alex Johnston’s medalist round earlier this week underscored Lakota West’s depth — even the Firebirds’ fifth golfer is capable of leading the field.
“That’s huge,” Fujiwara said. “And Steve, he’s like, you need to look out for our team. Because a guy like Alex, he’s a fifth golfer, can be a medalist anytime. I don’t think anybody expects us to be good, and we kind of like that. We feed off it.
The GMC Championship looms Tuesday and Wednesday, the event that could define Fujiwara’s senior campaign. He’ll have a week without competition to reset and refine his approach.
“A whole week to zone in,” he said. “Just focusing on the stuff that’s led to my past success. Really trusting the grind.”
Griffin’s breakthrough
If Krummen rediscovered joy and Fujiwara embraced humility, Wullenweber found consistency through Nguyen’s teachings. Once stuck in cycles of frustration, Wullenweber turned to his coach for help.
“I can’t get over this hump,” Wullenweber told him.
Nguyen responded with a six-month journey of meditation, mindfulness and intentional practice. He introduced his junior golfer to the idea that the sport is something you do, not who you are.
“At first, I’m sure he looked at me like Mr. Miyagi,” Nguyen said with a laugh. “But he trusted the process.”
The results have been stunning. Wullenweber now leads the GMC in scoring, routinely carding rounds in the 30s.
“I told him, ‘Don’t take that credit away from yourself. You practiced for this. You earned it,’” Nguyen recalled telling Wullenweber.
More importantly, Wullenweber embraced the philosophy. In a school interview, his coach remembered him saying, “I don’t do what Coach asks me to do for golf. I do it because it makes me a better person. That’s why I’m a better golfer.”
“When he said that, I thought to myself, that’s it. That’s the whole point.”
When Wullenweber reflects on his rise in GMC competition, he doesn’t begin by talking about his swing, his scores or even his training schedule. Now, he talks about his mind.
“I’ve always been a hothead,” Wullenweber admitted with a smile. “I’d hit a bad shot, and I was slamming clubs, throwing. I just needed a change.”
That self-awareness led to one of the most important conversations of his young career.
“I told Coach, ‘Can you coach me on my mental game? Just leave me alone with my actual game,’” Wullenweber recalled. “I knew something had to change.”
“It’s been cool to see the results. I wouldn’t say I’m very talented, to be honest. I just really make sure I work as hard as possible. I take pride in the work I do. I’m very, very blessed to see it pay off.”
His steady rise mirrors a program that, under Nguyen’s leadership, is reshaping its identity.
Though this is Nguyen’s first official season as head coach, he has been around Lakota West golf for years. His influence, Wullenweber said, has been immediate and refreshing.
“It’s really cool,” Wullenweber said of playing for Nguyen. “The approach he has on this team, it’s different, but we love it. We love Coach Steve, and he’s going to do really, really good things for Lakota West in the future.”
“Physically, I don’t think I’ve gotten much better,” Wullenweber added. “But between the ears, it’s changed the whole thing.
“We’ve worked very, very hard, and the year, to be quite honest, hasn’t been as good as we would like. But we’re very, very faithful. We 100 percent think the work we’ve put in is going to pay off at the right time. We’re going to peak at the right time.”
That time could be as soon as next week, when Lakota West heads into the GMC Championships.
“We’re going to continue to work hard,” Wullenweber said. “We’re just going to go have fun. We’re not going to overcomplicate it. Whatever’s meant to be will be.”
