From Multi-Sport Athlete to Pro Golfer: James Nicholas's Journey

James, I want to kind of just document your journey. It's a bit unique when I look at where you played your collegiate golf course, playing at Yale, playing multi-sports in high school growing up, being very successful in football, hockey, and golf, actually winning 11 letters, which I didn't even know was possible in high school, combined with all the three different sports you played. So why don't you just talk a little bit about your upbringing and how really just sports Whether it be football, hockey, and golf, and how you ultimately ended up sticking to golf and making it a professional career. Yeah, it's a very, very long story, but I'll kind of give you the highlights. Well, guess what? It's a podcast. We're here for it. Yeah. So growing up, I always played everything. I was on the swim and dive team as a kid. I played football, basketball, tennis, hockey, lacrosse, soccer. My parents loved sports, and they introduced us to everything. I'm one of five kids, and all four of my siblings are incredible athletes and people in their own rights, and I am extremely proud of them. So That also helped, pushing each other, playing in the backyard together, and being on the same teams as my brothers and even my sisters. We played on the same hockey team. My sister played high school hockey. That's awesome. Where were you in the age with all your brothers and sisters? Okay, so the oldest. So you're going to definitely try to win all the games that you're setting forth for all your brothers and sisters. Yeah, exactly. Blood, sweat, and tears. And there was a lot of bloodshed for sure. We would get gritty with it. Yeah, I mean, growing up, I was playing everything, and then I got to high school, and my plan was to play football in the fall, hockey in the winter, and then lacrosse in the spring. I ended up breaking my collarbone in football, and then I broke it again in hockey, and then I went to get cleared for lacrosse, and essentially, my dad's an orthopedic surgeon, and the nurse at the school who clears you for the sport. She was like, I don't think it's a great idea for you to play lacrosse. Why don't you play golf? I know you're good at it. Why don't you just, you know, have a nice leisurely springtime sport? And I was like, well, OK, is this 14 to 14? OK. So you haven't, so you haven't played a ton of golf to this point, but in the summertime, I grew up in New York and I was fortunate enough to be member, like, you know, my football coach called me country club kid or a country club boy. And he, you know, my parents were members at a club and I had the opportunity to play at a great club growing up. And he would always make fun of me, a country club kid or whatever. So I ended up playing golf. I ended up qualifying for the state championship, which was the first time a freshman had qualified in a lot of years. 87, 88 at States. So it wasn't like this, you know, heroic story, but it gave me this drive to, wow, like golf is a lot of fun. I like competing. And from then on out, I played football, hockey, and golf. Those are my, my three sports. And then when it came time to apply to colleges, I applied to 40 something, I think 47 colleges, some for hockey, some for football, and none for just golf. I was not good enough to play golf in college, but I got the opportunity to play football and golf at Yale, and I took it right when I got it. I was like, you know what, I can set my future up, I can go to a great university, I can learn a lot, I can grow as a person, and I get to play on the number one college golf course. In the country or in the world, whatever it is, it's number one. And so I took that opportunity. I went to play football at Yale, hated football after a year, committed to golf. And that long story, I guess, includes we did a spring break trip to Cypress Point, Pebble Beach, MPCC, Spyglass, SFGC, using the connections of the Yale alumni very well. And I told my coach, sold, like, I'm in, whatever. And then I got much better when I was there, went to Q School and, you know, fast forward six years and now we're here. Okay, what about that freshman year playing for the Yale football team made you not like it as much? Was it just golf was just kind of waving at you over there in the corner and just that golf itch, or was it more about, man, playing collegiately is a lot different than high school football and it was way more maybe than you anticipated? I think maybe a little bit all of the above. I was a big fish in a small pond in high school. I felt like I was the guy. I played every position, didn't get off the field. And then you get to college. Well, yeah. Well, yeah, at high school, right? Yeah, high school version. And then in New York, too. And then you get to college where it's the best players from each high school. And I was, so the depth chart went Foye, Luokan, who is the captain and the starting, I think he's playing linebacker now, for the Jaguars. And then me. I was never going to surpass Foye. Foye was an absolute beast. And. Did you play DB? Where did you play? He was strong safety. So we were both strong safeties. And it was also like this love for the game. I kind of was dwindling. I didn't love as much hockey. Hockey was my pure love. That was the sport where once I quit football, I was going to walk onto the hockey team at Yale and then just continue playing hockey and probably pursue hockey after school. That was my best sport by far. But then we went on that spring break trip and I was like, I am, I am in. Wow. This is, this is it.