"Maui Wowie."

Not bad, in summing up Sam Cyr's four years of golf at Point Loma Nazarene University.

But, "Oh, Wow, Makawao," is mo bettah.

There's no better way to describe Cyr's accomplishments at the NAIA school in San Diego: a four-time All-America selection, 12 victories and back-to-back national championships. He repeated as the NAIA's individual champion with a three-stroke victory at the TPC at Deere Run in Silvis, Ill., last month.

"He set the world on fire in golf for us. He was a big-time player for us," said Ben Foster, Point Loma's golf coach for 35 years. "He's had quite a career and we've been fortunate to have him. He's an outstanding golfer and a great young man."

Cyr, who has a couple of classes remaining for a degree in business administration, also feels the same way about his experience at Point Loma, a school with an undergraduate enrollment of 3,000. "I enjoyed my time at Point Loma for sure. It's the nicest campus in the country in my opinion," said Cyr, although some of his buddies at Pepperdine begged to differ.

As far as Cyr and Foster are concerned, divine intervention played a role in the King Kekaulike High graduate going to Point Loma.

"My parents wanted me to go to school on the Mainland," said Cyr, who leaves tonight after spending a week with his family on Maui. "I really wanted to play for a Christian school. I wanted to be in Southern California because of its good weather and I wanted to be as close to home as I could be and still be on the Mainland."

It also helped that his pastor at Pukalani Nazarene Church, Bale Kreps, and Cyr's youth pastor and good friend, Kaipo Thomas, graduated from Point Loma Nazarene. "They wanted me to go there." So Cyr and his father, Kevin, stopped in San Diego en route back from a junior golf tournament in Florida the summer before Cyr's senior year in high school.

Foster recalled the visit.

"The dad called, said we'd like to meet with you. Sam had a strong interest in attending a Christian college on the Mainland. He knew we competed at a strong Division-II level, had good weather in San Diego, pretty close to the ocean. Wasn't Maui, but. So, fortunately, it worked out quite well for us. I think we all were better for it. Sam has been a great NAIA player, no question about it."

Now, can Cyr take it to the next level? He's certainly going to give it a shot, planning to turn professional at the end of summer and trying for the PGA qualifying school. "God willing, if everything goes well," Cyr says.

Foster admits it's tough making it on the PGA Tour. "You've got to be good, lucky and get hot at the right time," said Foster, noting that Joe Durant (Huntingdon, Ala., College) and Cameron Beckman (Texas Lutheran) were previous NAIA champions. They, however, didn't win back-to-back as Cyr did.

Winning consecutive titles was heady stuff, according to Cyr, even if it didn't go to his head. He didn't feel any pressure defending his title. "I knew what it was like because I blew it in my sophomore year. I had the lead going into the final round."

A three-peat. Now that would have been something, even at the NAIA level. But whatever level, a win is a win is a win. Twelve to be exact for Cyr, who didn't win any as a freshman although he finished runner-up a couple of times.

"No matter what level, any tournament is hard to win. There are a lot of good players out there," said Cyr, admitting that the caliber of talent goes deeper at the Division-I level. "But that wasn't my thing. It didn't matter that I didn't play at a D-I school as long as I got an opportunity to play and improve. To get better, that was the bottom line for me."

As the NAIA champion, Cyr received invitations to play in the Northeast Amateur in Rhode Island, the Porter Cup in Niagara Falls, N.Y., and the Western Amateur in Illinois. Besides trying to qualify for the U.S. Men's Amateur Public Links, Cyr will try to qualify for the U.S. Amateur. Not that there's any divine intervention, but his local qualifier is in — San Diego.

That's not all. Cyr won this year's NAIA title at TPC Deere Run, which is the site of the John Deere Classic, a PGA Tour event.

"There was a lot of talk that Sam might be offered a sponsor's exemption," Foster said. "That would be very special for that to work out for him and the community, which hosted the national championship, to have the player who won it come back and play there."

"That would be amazing," Cyr said.

Oh, wow, Makawao.