Kaiden Rockins is a Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover ALA-Gilbert North for AZPreps365.

On March 13, 2020, the United States government officially declared the pandemic as a national emergency. Seventeen days later, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey ordered that all schools in the state would be closed for the rest of the academic year.

For many student-athletes, the pandemic was a time away from their craft. But for Colton Wood, it was when he found his passion.

He is a sophomore student and varsity golfer at ALA-Gilbert North with an unlikely pandemic story.

Wood was always surrounded by golf with an older brother, Jackson Wood, on the varsity team and father, Justin Wood, a passionate golfer and current head coach of the ALA-Gilbert North boys golf team. Despite this, Wood wasn’t really interested in the sport growing up.

“He really just had no interest. He played basketball and football, (which) were his main two sports, also played baseball, but I couldn’t get him to do (golf),” his father said.

Then the pandemic hit, causing school to shut down and leaving many athletes like Wood figuring out what to do. Wood adapted to those extreme circumstances and started going out with his father and brother to the range.

“When COVID happened, all my other sports got canceled. And so I couldn’t really do any other sports. So I started golfing a lot. I loved it,” Wood said.

With his newfound passion, Wood was determined to put in the work leading into his freshman year.

“Once he came out, and he learned that he had kind of a natural ability and you know saw the ball kind of fly, he was like, oh, this is actually pretty fun, but it took kind of him having nothing else to do to get him out here," Justin Wood said. "And it’s funny that that’s what his experience was because now it’s all he wants to do."

In the summer leading up to it, Colton decided to take an online PE class, as well as a history class that had to be taken that summer and another one necessary before his sophomore year.

He knocked out those classes so when the school year started, he would be able to get out an hour early to golf.

Wood practicing his swing at Alta Mesa Golf Club (Photo by Kaiden Rockins/AZPreps365)

Jake Goyen, a teammate and friend of Wood, was also determined to get as much time on the course as possible and took the same summer classes.

“You know, it sucked over summer but you just bust it out and get it over with, and it’s nice now,” Goyen said.

Wood brings to the course a competitive energy, and it’s definitely not underappreciated or unnoticed.

“The reason I like playing with Colton the best is because Colton has a lot more fire than everyone else – like he wants to be better than everybody. There’s other kids that are pretty decent, but nobody wanted to win like Colton did,” Goyen said.

Wood is on an upward trajectory with the sport seeing as he just fell in love with it three years ago and actually started competing in tournaments only 18 months ago. He is improving and is now comfortably playing rounds under par.

If someone asked Wood in 2020 if he wanted to golf in college he would’ve said “no,” but now golfing after high school is a main goal of his.

“I’m looking to get a scholarship somewhere. I’m hoping for BYU but really anywhere I can get,” Wood said.

During the time of the pandemic, many people found hobbies or binge-watched Netflix, but Wood found his passion. With his sophomore fall season in the rearview mirror, he now looks onto the spring season, pushing for improvement and keeping that competitive fire ablaze.