Autistic kids get into swing at Nassau CC

Ernie Els would have been proud, and so would anyone else who, like the three-time major champion and World Golf Hall of Famer, stands behind youngsters with autism.

Fourteen children and teens from the Development Disabilities Institute were at the Nassau Community College gym and practice green Thursday morning. And by the time they left, all of them had become something they never were before: Golfers.

Every one of them departed from the clinic -- conducted by the college's coach and players -- with a certificate, a golf towel and that special golfer's feeling of having made solid contact.

"I was blown away," said Dan Rowland, director of development of the Smithtown-based institute, who approa- ched Nassau coach Larry Dell Aquila with the clinic idea and had positively no idea if it would work. Even some of the institute's teachers had been concerned about putting clubs in all those hands. "The fear is that their behaviors may be something to make you think, 'Oh they can't do that.' We don't believe that," Rowland said.

What the clinic showed is that golf is golf, whether it is mentoring a PGA Tour pro at the Masters or teaching an exuberant youngster named Chris who was pumped when his full wedge swing sent a tennis ball soaring through the gymnasium curtain. You can take that from Dell Aquila, who now has done both.

When Dell Aquila gathered the kids on the college's synthetic putting green and told them that Tiger Woods practices this kind of stuff all the time, he knew what he was talking about. He has seen Woods' private practice, as a guest of Woods' buddy and Nassau grad Arjun Atwal. In fact, it was a pre-Masters newspaper story about Dell Aquila and Atwal that inspired Rowland to ask the coach, a friend, to do the clinic.

Dell Aquila agreed and planned to meet at Augusta with Atwal's friend Els, who established the Els for Autism Foundation after his son was diagnosed with the condition (www.e4agolf.com offers rounds of golf at Winged Foot and other exclusive clubs). That didn't happen, but it didn't matter. The coach did not need any help.

He devised his own lesson plan: Start with having the students swing their arms back and forth, "like an elephant's trunk," he said. Then he had them toss volleyballs using the same motion, pretending the volleyball was a peanut. Finally he had each youngster use the same motion to swing a golf club.

"I always remember, dating back to my early days in education, the idea is that you want to make a skill a happy thing. And you want to have them succeed," he said, before repeating the clinic for 30 adults from DDI. "We made it fun and games."

The "we" included five members of the Nassau golf team, who taught the kids -- and learned plenty. "It went a lot better than I thought it was going to," said Josh Austin of Dix Hills, wearing his blue Nassau uniform shirt. "They were all able to hit the ball, they were all able to putt and they understood what was going on.''

Teammates laughed during the awards ceremony when Dell Aquila congratulated one of the young golfers for having made three putts, then nodded toward one of the college golfers, saying, "That's more than Mike made this week."

"It was an absolute great experience. I love the game and I love teaching," said Cory Huberty of Plainview, a team member who aspires to be a club pro. "It was unbelievable. It showed there is absolutely room in golf for everybody."

Everyone made at least one putt, of six inches to a foot. Huge cheers. And from the looks on the faces when they received certificates, you'd have thought Dell Aquila had given each one a green jacket.

"We hope we can make this a yearly thing," the coach told the group. Later, in an interview, he said, "If we could ever get these kids to Jones Beach to play one hole, how good would that be?"