Sun Devil Men’s Golf Wenyi Ding joined Tim Healey to talk about his journey to ASU and historic 2024 season.
welcome back to the final segment of this week’s installment of sundevil extra from the Mountain America Credit Union sundevil radio network I’m Tim Healey the radio voice of the sundevils and your host for each week’s show and we’re glad that you joined us continuing now with our preview of this weekend’s Pack 12 men’s golf championships which will take place this coming Friday through Sunday hosted by Arizona State University and taking place at Desert Forest golf club up in Carefree Arizona joining us now is a young man who has turned heads and opened eyes in his freshman season in Arizona state with his spectacular play on the golf course currently ranked by one Service as the number one Collegiate golfer in the nation he is one of two sundevils to be named a semi-finalist for the Ben Hogan award which is the equivalent of the Heisman Trophy in men’s Collegiate golf he comes from Beijing China and we are delighted to welcome Wy ding to Arizona State and to sundevil extra ding it’s great to see you tell us a little bit about how you got from Beijing to Tempe how you became in Arizona State sundevil yeah it’s has a lot like difference like travel from Beijing to here uh actually I’m not living in the city in Beijing mhm so it’s not like that hard to transfer to here yeah when you when uh I guess when you were about ready to decide on a college that’s right when covid hit wasn’t it how did that impact your ability to start looking at places to go to college it’s a lot uh it’s impact me a lot like I can’t come to America to play tournaments if I come I can’t go back so I’ll take too much risk mhm so I decide like uh stay in China and send emails to head coach mhm yeah and Coach Thurman was one of those to respond right yeah yeah I’m I’m really lucky yeah oh we’re we’re I think he feels he I think he feels like he is the lucky one for sure how tough an adjustment has it been to adjust to living in the United States uh like for living America the biggest problem for me is for really yeah is uh I’m skinny right now so I’m trying to find some Asian food I have time mhm yeah and for academic like I had online for from high school mhm so come to college so a little bit nervous for my academic score yeah yeah your English is very good how how challenging has the language been to learn how to speak English like the biggest problem for me is grammar like I studyed by myself in China I just like learn a little bit in my primary school mhm and after Middle School and High School i p a lot a lot of time to play tournaments so like my grandma is not good it’s it sounds pretty dog on good to me you won the US J Junior Amateur Championship back in 2022 that was played at Bandon Dunes in Oregon what did that do for your confidence level and get you on a path to where you are now like honestly before I I I went to the B I thought like I just prepare I have no idea how to win this tournament and after the like the qualifier like the first two round qualify to the match play I feel good because that is a really windy golf course and I did really well on the parser I have a big Advantage yeah have you surprised yourself with the uccess you’ve had this year uh yeah it was surprised me because uh I was really nervous like how to uh planning my time to practice golf playing the course and how to like put my time to study MH now ding sing at your moment as we talked about earlier in the show with Coach Matt Thurman came in February in Hawaii when when he set the all-time NCAA record for the lowest score 54 hole score against par in NCAA history when he finished 27 underpar 189 at the air AR indiv Invitational in Hawaii think back to that weekend uh what enabled you to play so magnificently that weekend like it was amazing I if I play that again I probably cannot do that like uh it was lucky because that week There’s No win for Hawaii and which is unusual for Hawaii for sure yeah last year they canceled tournament because the wind was too strong wow yeah so it was a really really good experiment coach said that you were like a machine that weekend what were you did you feel like you were quote unquote in the zone that day or that weekend yeah I was Phil like really good for my golf performance like I just have to think about how to make birdie like it’s not too hard for me that week apparently not at 27 underpar for three holes you’re the number one ranked player in the nation you’re as we mentioned earlier one of two sundevils to be semi-finalist for the Ben Hogan award what do those achievements mean to you at this stage of your career I mean for me probably the biggest like successful like transition from uh a player to a student athlete mhm yeah so it’s meaning I I did well for my academic and also do well for my golf and your other teammate who’s also a semi-finalist for the Hogan award is Preston summer hazee talk about Preston and how you two get along and maybe challenge each other and what like to be his teammate uh I was sing him to win the US junor in I think in 20 2022 was it or I think 2019 could oh it could be yeah so like I know him pretty well he he is a really good players and really strong for mental and really good golf skills yeah how do you like your team’s chances this weekend at the Pack 12 championships and what will be some of the keys for your team to have success I think we have the best player in the nation and in the whole whole world like we have a lot of Adventure a good Adventure players from Europe from Asia from America so we have a really good chance what do you know about desert Forest golf club and getting the chance to play there it was shock me my my first time to play it and actually the farway is not narrow but the vision makes you feel like really nervous when you stand on the tea mhm so it’s a big Challenge and probably will be windy when play the tournament yeah tell us a little bit about what you’re majoring or what you want to study at Arizona State and what your other than golf what your future plans are uh I choose uh business communic communication at first but I realize this a little bit hard for me so I change to a liberal study so make me like have more free time to practice mhm for sure well we wish you continued success in your golf career to Arizona State and wish you and your teammates success this weekend at the Pack 12 championships thanks for visiting with us thank you that’s sundevil freshman golfer Wy ding he has been our guest on this our final segment of this week’s installment of sundevil extra we bring down the curtain now on this week’s show a couple of thank yous before we leave we always hate to do this but we got to do it anyway and thank our executive producer Arizona State senior associate athletic director Doug tamro for his help and thanks as well to our terrific engineer producer Shan cresen of the Mountain America Credit Union sundevil radio network for his assistance also we’re back in two weeks with another edition of sundevil extra and we we hope you’ll join us then till then I’m Tim Healey thanks for joining us so long everybody [Music]
