Florida men’s golf coach J.C. Deacon is big on preparation. But nothing could have prepared him for the bombshell that landed on March 12, when the NCAA cancelled its winter and spring championships in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. “[W]e were playing in a six-ball with five of my players, and we were driving up the ninth hole at our course,” Deacon said. “And the tweet came through from the NCAA, and that was it.” A few days later, the Southeastern Conference did the same with its remaining events for the 2019-20 school year. Since then, Deacon has shifted from instructor to mentor, helping his players navigate an unprecedented turn of events following a shortened season when the Gators were rolling (finishing fourth or better in three spring events, including a win in the Florida Gators Invitational). More than anything, Deacon is urging his players to make the best of a bad situation. “If this goes on for quite some time, which it possibly could, it’ll be wild — because I think some guys are gonna use the time wisely,” Deacon said. “And they’re gonna get better and see their games and their fitness improve, and their mentalities improve. And some guys will have a lot of lost time that they might regret and want to have back.”
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LYING FOUR: This must be a strange time for you, in a time of year that’s usually very busy and suddenly having nothing to do.
J.C. DEACON: Yeah, these days are usually the busiest and some of the most exciting, because we’re leading into the postseason and everyone’s kind of getting dialed in and ready to go. But the new reality has set in. I’ve always been conditioned to control what you can control. This is what we’ve got. So I’m getting to be a 24/7 dad — and I don’t have to set an alarm anymore, because the girls take care of that for me; they wake me up, and then things shut down when they go to bed at night. It’s pretty much just doing what they want to do all day, and keeping them active and organized, and trying to instill a little discipline and to keep the house clean and do some things like that. It’s been a new challenge for me, and I’m enjoying it.
LYING FOUR: It must be a little weird, going from long days at the office to long days at home — but also a nice change of pace.
J.C. DEACON: We travel so much, with recruiting and competition and all the things that come with being a coach; I never get to do what I’m doing right now — a little bit in the summer, but there’s still so much going on. So having this every day and really getting to know our daughters’ routines and what they do and what they’re like, and what they enjoy and don’t enjoy has been really cool, from the dad perspective. I’m definitely making the best of this. It’s been fun. I don’t know how much longer it will last, but to this point it’s been fun.
LYING FOUR: When the NCAA announced that spring championships were going to be cancelled, did you have any indication that was coming? Or did you find out about that when everybody else did?
J.C. DEACON: I’ll tell you what — we were playing in a six-ball with five of my players, and we were driving up the ninth hole at our course. And things hadn’t been looking good, because the NBA had suspended their season, and we were all worried about what was going down. And it was just unfortunate, because our team was getting hot: we won a tournament, we came second in another one, we came in fourth in Las Vegas — which has the strongest field of any regular season event. So our guys were feeling it and feeling super-good. And the tweet came through from the NCAA, and that was it. Everyone was just in shock and pretty disappointed. That was how all six of us found out.
LYING FOUR: There’s no instruction manual for how to talk to your players about that; the whole thing is unprecedented. But how did you talk to your players about it?
J.C. DEACON: Kind of the same way that we talk to them about their mental toughness with golf and approaching challenges on the golf course — this is completely out of our control; we didn’t choose this, we don’t want this. We all knew how good we were playing and how hot the team was, so everyone was extremely disappointed, but it is what it is. This is the new reality. And how are we gonna benefit from it? How are we gonna make ourselves better? Just going around the room and having the guys come up with their own ideas and their own goals of how they’re gonna make things better and use this time. I guess the crazy part of it has been that it’s changing so much. We’re getting new news every couple of days, and there’s just been a lot going on. It’s constantly fluid, and I think to this point the guys have done a really great job of adjusting. Most of them had to get home and take care of their schoolwork and stay fit, and just be ready. We’re gonna get back to normal here at some point, and there’s gonna be some guys who are ready to go. And those guys need to be us.
LYING FOUR: Have different players responded in different ways, or does everybody pretty much have the same questions and concerns?
J.C. DEACON: I think it was especially heartbreaking for Blake Dyer, who was our fifth-year senior and who had worked his tail off for four-and-a-half years to get a solid spot in the lineup. He’d finally gotten there and had just played three of his best college tournaments ever this spring. For him to have it end, I think it was really kind of difficult for him to process and understand. It’s like, “Man, I worked this hard and finally realized one of my goals, and then it gets stripped away from me; that doesn’t make any sense.” So it was tough for him. And then John Axelsen — who’s a junior, but he’s turning pro after this year — that kid’s just poured his heart and soul into our program, and given our team everything. He didn’t know it, but for him to hit his last shot in Las Vegas for us — that wasn’t the way he was planning to end it. It was really tough for those two. But the other guys — we’ve got a great team full of a bunch of guys with some great character. They’re just going with the flow; they’re pretty easygoing. I think they all miss each other and miss being around each other. We’ve got a really close kind of family; we spend a lot of time eating together and playing pingpong and practicing and playing golf, and I think everyone misses that. For the most part, our guys have handled it really impressively. I think time will tell, as we see their grades and when I see their golf games and fitness levels when this stuff clears up. They have all day to pick and choose what they want to do. I know for sure that some guys are going to use that time to their advantage — and hopefully that’s all of them, but we’ll see in time.
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LYING FOUR: How much of your job is instruction, and how much of it is armchair sports psychiatrist? And what does that look like in a situation like this?
J.C. DEACON: It’s just different with everyone. Some guys, you need to help them a lot with their golf game, and they need to learn a ton and learn new shots and different things. And then some guys, it’s just 100 percent working on their mind. You’ve gotta build up their trust; that’s always going to be the most important thing, and that’s why I spend a lot of my time trying to do that. It’s probably about 80-20, I would say — working on toughness, and then the other 20 percent working on their golf game. It’s kind of an all-around thing: their discipline in life, and getting things done in school, being on time, getting things done at the gym, getting in good routines, good eating habits, good self-talk habits. It’s just constant, in all areas of their life. We’re trying to take these kids that we get at 18, and then make sure at 22 that they’re men who are ready to tackle the real world.
LYING FOUR: What does recruiting look like for you, with pretty much the entire world on lockdown?
J.C. DEACON: Well, we’re banned from any recruiting aside from communication — so we can still text and call recruits that are of age. But other than that, we’re not allowed to have any visits on or off campus. And we’re not allowed to speak to 2022s until June 15, so there’s not a ton going on. I’ve stayed in contact with the guys we’re allowed to, but other than that, it’s just been kind of planning for next year, making sure the team is set, and making sure that my business is taken care of — so that when we get the green light, we’re ready to go. We’re in a bit of a holding pattern, as all sports are. But the NCAA, and especially the SEC, has done a great job of putting safety first and putting sports on the back burner. It was hard for all of us to understand because it’s our life, but I think it was the right thing to do.
LYING FOUR: You mentioned planning for the moment when you get a green light. Does the open-endedness of this thing, and the uncertainty of knowing when you’re going to get that green light — does that make your planning more difficult?
J.C. DEACON: I think that’s the hardest part of this. And I think that’s the hardest part of this for the kids, too. A lot of us — athletes, anyway — are really good deadline workers. And when you know you have a tournament, or you know the season is starting, or you know you need to plan for something, we can get after it and get it done. But it’s so open-ended that you don’t really know what you’re planning for. To be honest, I’m hopeful that we’re starting in September and that we’re playing and traveling, but is that guaranteed? Absolutely not, with how fluid this is. It does make it more difficult. All of us in this situation are never used to having this kind of time on our hands — so you try to find good ways to use it. But it’s hard on everyone — especially the people whose jobs depend on this stuff. It’s incredibly scary. We’re lucky at this point: we have a salary and can support our families. I can’t imagine the people really being affected by this pandemic.
LYING FOUR: Maybe your kids are smarter than I was when I was in college, but when I was 20 years old, I’m not sure that I could have grasped the gravity of a situation like this. How are your players tackling this? And I don’t mean how they divide up their time between schoolwork and practice; I mean, do they understand the seriousness of all this?
J.C. DEACON: Sometimes I think our guys live a little too much in their own bubble, and they get so focused on what they’re doing and their own tournaments and workouts. But I think this has forced them to look outside themselves. We’ve got a massive issue, and I think we’ve still got a long way to go before we’re out of it. I think this is gonna end up being a really good thing; it’s forced people to think outside their own bubble. I’m absolutely guilty of that in my own life. But it puts things in perspective. Who are you when you don’t have golf, or you don’t have school? What does your circle look like? What do your habits look like? It’s going to have people asking a lot of questions, and I think it can be a really good thing. Our guys have been good so far. But their phones, and Netflix, and social media helps pass the time a little bit. If this goes on for quite some time, which it possibly could, it’ll be wild — because I think some guys are gonna use the time wisely. And they’re gonna get better and see their games and their fitness improve, and their mentalities improve. And some guys will have a lot of lost time that they might regret and want to have back.
LYING FOUR: For a lot of programs, maybe this layoff isn’t the worst thing in the world; I could see teams that are struggling might need a hard reset. But does the fact that you guys were playing so well make this more difficult?
J.C. DEACON: Actually, I look at it the other way. I’m really thankful that we were playing the way we were, and that we were as hot as we were. Imagine having to go into this break playing poorly and not feeling good. This is the best that it’s felt in our program for two years. I’m really excited about that. I know the guys are really excited; they’re all messaging each other and are pretty fired up and excited for next year. It looks like we’re going to have a heck of a lineup again, so it’s going to be really competitive and a lot of fun. Ending on a really positive note is a good thing. We absolutely would’ve loved to have seen what this team could have done; I think we had two of the best guys in the country in our lineup, and we had three or four guys that were really pushing to give them some backup. There was a lot of good going on, and a lot of hard work being done. I think ending on a good note is a positive. We’ve just got so many competitors on our team that I know they’re gonna carry it into 2020.
All photos: credit UAA Communications
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