The cheapest good evening in Scottsdale golf
Coronado is what golf in Scottsdale looked like before it got expensive. It is a nine-hole executive course on Miller Road in South Scottsdale, just north of Thomas Road, opened on November 1, 1965, and it has stayed stubbornly the same: walk-up play, cash at the counter, a lighted range and cheap beer.
The course is 1,850 yards, par 31: five par 3s and four par 4s on Bermuda grass, rated 28.4 with a slope of 80, which is the golf-course way of saying anyone can play it. Its own description is “easy to play, nothing fancy and quick,” and that is accurate. The target pace is two hours for the nine.
The range is the bigger draw. It is lit and open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day, it has won the Phoenix New Times’ best driving range award in 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2025, and its 4-to-8 happy hour on balls and beer is a south Scottsdale institution.
This is the place to take a beginner, a kid or yourself on a Tuesday after work. It is not the place to bring a credit card.
What it costs and how it works
Bring cash. Coronado takes no credit cards, digital payments or checks, and there is no ATM on site. The course says avoiding card fees is how it keeps prices where they are. Stop at a bank or convenience store on Scottsdale or Hayden Road on the way.
2026 rates:
- Walking nine: $24
- Walking with a pushcart: $29
- Riding (green fee and electric cart): $34
- Replay nine: $14, one at a time, if there is room
- Juniors 5 to 16: $12
- Rental clubs: $20
No tee times. Play is first come, first served from 7 a.m., and the last start is two hours before sunset. The only bookable times are two daily specials, 1 p.m. and 2 p.m., on GolfNow. Call (480) 947-8364 to check on league play before you drive over on a weekday evening.
The range: open daily 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., last bucket at 8. A regular large bucket is $14.50. From 4 to 8 p.m. happy hour drops a 40-ball bucket to $7.50, 80 balls to $11.50 and 120 to $12.50, with $3 domestic cans; PBR and Keystone Light are $2 all day. There are putting greens and chipping areas too.
The rules are few and sensible. Shirts are required, T-shirts are fine, hats face forward, and shoes are soft spikes or sneakers. Only drinks bought in the shop may be consumed on the property, by Arizona law, and coolers need permission. Carts take two people, drivers must be 18 with a license, and the course is serious about anyone who damages the turf or “donuts” a cart. Errant shots into the neighbors’ yards are the player’s responsibility, which is worth remembering on a course squeezed into a neighborhood. There is a restroom by the 6th hole.
Overseeding dates are not posted online; every Bermuda course in the Valley overseeds in the fall, so call before an October visit. Our overseeding entry explains why.
A 1965 neighborhood course that never changed the model
Coronado opened on November 1, 1965, a decade and a half after Scottsdale incorporated, when the city was still filling in with new subdivisions south of Old Town. It was owned and run by Tom Lambie, a PGA professional, and designed by Milton Coggins, Greg H. Nash and Jeff D. Hardin. Nash and Hardin’s names turn up again a short walk north at Continental, the par-60 executive course at Hayden and Osborn. Our 1960s chapter covers the Scottsdale it was built into.
What is remarkable is how little has changed. Plenty of Valley courses from that era have been sold, rebuilt, renamed or turned into houses. Coronado still runs on a walk-up sheet, still takes cash only and still sells $2 beer, and it describes its job plainly: an affordable way into the game for beginners, seniors and kids. Sixty years later that is a rarer thing in Scottsdale than a $300 tee time.
It fits easily into a south Scottsdale evening. The Indian Bend Wash Greenbelt and Eldorado Park are just south on Miller Road for a walk, Chula Seafood is on Roosevelt and Frasher’s on Scottsdale Road for dinner, and if the nine has you wanting a real 18 at a city price, Papago is ten minutes west. For more on where locals play without a resort rate, see golf without a membership.