There was no golf team at Kapolei back when AJ Mercado was a high school student.

Mercado played in youth tournaments and, over time, parlayed his love for the sport into a decade as an assistant club pro at Kapolei Golf Club. One day, an 11-year-old boy showed up during group lessons.

Julian Samia remembers sending white spheres of pain throughout the vicinity.

“I was taking lessons from AJ. I was terrible. I was using a driver, so he introduced me to putting and chipping. I almost killed his ankles because I kept blading it,” he said. “I told him, ‘This isn’t the sport for me. I almost killed you. It’s too complicated.’ He said, ‘It’s a slow process, but part of it is learning and being patient.’ He taught me patience and discipline.”

Mercado’s canny insight made all the difference.

“He was completely new, never swung a club. I thought that he’ll be a really good golfer because he has a strong mind. He was really curious about golf, kept asking me questions. ‘Why does it go left? Why does it go right? Why can’t it go up in the air?’ The strongest part of his game is his mind,” Mercado said.

Now a junior at Waipahu, Samia put his game together and carded a 70 at Barbers Point Golf Course to win the OIA boys tournament. It was the second league tourney on the schedule. In the first tourney, Samia placed third with a 74, two shots behind winner Nate Choi of Moanalua at Oahu Country Club.

Last week, he tied for third with a 74, again two shots behind Choi, at Hoakalei Golf Club.

In 2022, Samia is the only OIA boys golfer to break par so far.

“It’s easy to say you want to do something, but to actually go out there and put in the work is a whole ’nother story,” Waipahu coach Michael Englar said. “His driver distance and accuracy is incredible right now.”

Samia credits one of his competitors.

“What made it easy for me is Nate Choi wasn’t there (at Barbers Point). He said he had something to take care of and I felt 10 times better with him not there,” Samia said.

Mercado, now the head golf pro at Waikele Country Club, was not surprised.

“Not at all. Last year, he was up there, playing pretty good, only had a couple of bad holes. This year, he’s been placing in the top five. We knew he was going to break the ice pretty soon,” he said. “That’s his lowest round, with five bogeys, seven birdies.”

Frenemies mode — with the usual joking and trash talking — is always in play when Samia, Choi, Jet Magsinide (Campbell) and the OIA’s top players are on the course. Samia enjoys the banter and camaraderie, but it still comes down to fundamentals.

“I was able to hit all my drives straight. That is my all-time best (round) and we played from the blue tees. It’s usually the white tees,” he said. “At Barbers Point, that’s when my competitors were in my ear, talking left and right, trying to mess with me. We go back and forth, all of us do. I love those guys. We have a competition to see who can get closest to the pin. I love the nerves. I love the competition. You can’t depend on anybody else. All the pressure is on you. You’re on your own, win or lose.”

Like former Roosevelt standout Kolbe Irei, now a sophomore golfer at UC Irvine, Samia plays to his strengths. Samia is 5 feet, 3 inches, so his approach is a bit of a zig while most others zag. The baseball analogy may be that he’s more Tony Gwynn than Ken Griffey Jr.

“He likes playing a low cut. That’s one of the shots he’s been working on,” Mercado said. “All the other kids want to hit it high and far. His low cut on the second shot is what he used at Barbers Point. That’s his thing. He’s pretty consistent.”

Samia’s first time on a course was with his father, Junior. Neither had played before.

“It was my dad’s idea. He took some of his friends and brought me along with them to Hawaii Country Club by Kunia Road. We had 20-year-old clubs,” he recalled. “He gave me a sand wedge and told me to hit it as straight as I could. It took me about 10 tries to hit it straight. I even hit it backwards, but I enjoyed the thrill of hitting the ball as hard as I could.”

The portal to another universe had opened.

“My dad eventually kept playing,” Samia said. “He’s really consistent with the driver and he used to always beat me, and he’d rub it in.”

Junior Samia made it a point to get under his oldest son’s skin.

“My dad was really patient. He saw me enjoy the sport so he let me practice. The start of my second year, he started to push me more to practice. The results were there, but I wasn’t consistent,” Julian Samia said.

There was a Junior Golf tourney at the Hawaii Prince.

“My first tournament. I shot 120 and I went home crying,” Samia said. “I wasn’t always a competitive person. In the first three years, I was trying to figure things out. My dad’s whole idea was to shoot lower first, then compete. So I played one tournament so he could see where I was. He didn’t want to waste money on a lot of tournaments. If you get embarrassed, get embarrassed at practice.”

Pushing Julian was part of the process.

“He would always be loud at me, trying to strengthen my mind. ‘Bet you five bucks you won’t reach the green.’ He would video me a lot of the time. All that yelling and correcting was to just help my mind game,” he said. “I started realizing that and blocking it out. It strengthened my mind. People I play with, they can talk and try to make sure I won’t get a (better) score than them, but it doesn’t faze me anymore because of my dad. He set me up for that.”

Junior Samia named his first son after a character in “Big Daddy,” a movie, Julian Samia said.

“I have a younger brother, Benjamin and young sister, Maya,” he said.

Waipahu’s boys team has four players: Christian Chon, Micah Naniole-Furutani, Alex Tokunaga and Samia. The girls have two: Kylie Yasuda and Lauren Yoza. They are varied in personalities and skill levels but enjoy the company.

“We practice as a team at Ted Makalena on Wednesdays. We play nine holes. On Saturdays, we practice at Mililani, but I work weekends,” Samia said.

To make some spending money and sometimes get extra rounds in, Samia works part time at Waikele Country Club. First job, golf course. Life is good.

“My coach (Mercado) recommended me. He saw how often I was practicing, how many balls I was hitting and how much I was spending,” Samia said. “I’m just happy doing something I love. The management and all the employees are really welcoming.”

Mercado knew Samia would be a good fit.

“He really works hard, too. He works with a lot of retired guys, so he earns the respect from those guys. He’s young and the only one who can run around the golf course and chase the carts,” Mercado said. “He comes two or three hours before his shift, goes to the range first, then goes back after work.”

It’s dark, nearly an hour after sunset, when Samia is finally done practicing.

“As long as you can hear the ball, you know if it’s a good shot or bad shot,” Mercado noted. “Just listen to the ball. He’s a pretty smart guy.”

Samia has a 3.7 grade-point average.

“Julian is his own personality, I would say. I’ve never taught anyone that I can compare his dedication and mindset to. He brings that attitude, having friendships with golfers, but at the same time he’s a very competitive boy,” Mercado said.

JULIAN SAMIA’S FAVORITES

>> Did you know? Julian is named after a character in the movie “Big Daddy.”

>> Funniest teammate: Lauren Yoza. “She’s really sarcastic and she heavily criticizes my inability to sink three-foot putts. She rags me. She can hit a 10 (strokes) on a hole and she sees me in three-putt and she starts laughing at me.”

>> Smartest teammate: Reyan Lee. “She graduated last year. She was in basically every early college class and had a perfect ACT score. She was in the Science Olympiad and was valedictorian, I think.”

>> Teammate most likely to coach one day: Reyan Lee. “Her dad is a coach at Mililani. She’s outgoing and really charming. It’s important to talk to students and have them understand what you’re talking about. It’s good to have charisma. Talking about swing problems, it can be pretty embarrassing at times.”

>> Top 3 shows/movies: “Thor: Ragnarok,” “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” “The Office.” “Dwight’s the best. He’s ridiculous. I would love to work with someone like that.”

>> Top 3 food/snack/drink: Buttered popcorn, Popeye’s fried chicken, Orange Crush soda

>> Homemade: “My mom (Melissa) makes carne asada tacos probably once a month.”

>> Top 3 music artists: Sticky Fingers, UB40, Gregory Isaacs

>> Athletes: Giannis Antetokounmpo and LaMelo Ball. “LaMelo’s passing is just something.”

>> Class/teacher: “Back in eighth grade, my teacher (at Waipahu Intermediate) was Ian Rush and he would break down media and teach us techniques. We flew to Seattle for an STN (video) competition. It was fun.”

>> GPA: 3.7

>> Bucket list: Bahamas, Las Vegas

>> Time machine: “I want to see what life is like in 100 years from now. Would there be flying cars like in ‘Back to the Future’?”