Shubhankar Sharma will be making his major debut this week, but the 21-year-old seems to have done enough in the last few months to catch the attention of some of the biggest names in the game.
Ahead of the Masters, Sharma received the ultimate compliment from five-time major champion Phil Mickelson, who compared him to Tiger Woods, while Jordan Spieth felt there was no reason why the young Indian star could not master the Augusta National Golf Club course in his rookie year and post a very good finish.
Mickelson, who mistook Sharma for a pesky journalist trying to disturb his practice session while playing the WGC-Mexico Championship, later played the final round in the leader group with him and managed to overtake the Chandigarh pro for his first win in five years.
Sharma may not have had the best of final rounds playing alongside Mickelson, but he impressed the three-time Masters champion with his skills and tenacity.
"Given the way he played in Mexico and his talent level, I'm excited that he has the opportunity to play here and compete at the Masters," Mickelson said. "It will create more awareness in his home country for the game of golf. I think the growth potential in India is enormous, and what he's doing to help grow that game could very well be similar to what Tiger has done to grow golf in the US and world."
The Masters has historically proven to be notoriously tough for rookies, but Spieth won it in his second attempt after coming very close in his first year in 2014 when he finished second to Bubba Watson.
The 24-year-old Texan had no doubts that if Sharma continues to play the golf he has been playing lately, he'd be in good shape come Sunday.
Asked if he had any advice for Sharma, Spieth said: "I think, honestly, do exactly what he's been doing because he's playing great golf.
"There's necessarily no real secret out here. You kind of want to figure out the angles, you want to figure out where the misses are, because you can obviously get into some big trouble around the greens if you're in the wrong location. So, it's a lot of homework, and then just committing to that.
"You don't have to try and birdie every hole. There are holes like the 15th...if I had any discipline last year, I would have had the lead going into Sunday, and instead I made a nine on 15 trying to go at a pin with a wedge on a par-5. Imagine that!
"So just learning the golf course a little bit, picking your spots, and letting it come to him. But he's been playing really well, and therefore, if he does that first part, he should find himself in contention."
Four-time Masters champion Woods, who is expected to make a strong return to the tournament this year after impressing in his latest comeback from a third back surgery, also spoke about Indian golf's man of the moment.
Asked what it meant to him when someone of Sharma's age says he has taken up golf because of the way the 14-time major champion played and dominated the game, Woods said he was still getting used to such tributes, but added that he would like nothing better than beating the youngsters.
"I'm still getting used to that part because I don't feel like it's been that long that I've been out here and competing and playing. A lot of these kids like Sharma, some of their first memories are of when I won my last major championship," Woods, 42, said.
"It really started hitting home when I was the vice-captain of the last two [American] teams and some of the questions they asked or some of the things they would say. It's flattering, it's nice, but I still want to compete and I want to beat these guys, and hopefully this will be a good week."
Sharma starts his Masters campaign on Thursday in the company of Augusta native and 1987 champion Larry Mize and Russell Henley at 2202 IST.
(Joy Chakravarty is a Dubai-based golf journalist who has followed Indian golf for the past 22 years. He has covered 16 majors and over 100 international tournaments)