Hello again from Knoxville, Tennessee, home of the 2017 SEC Men’s Tennis Championships.
We were in Rocky Top a couple of weeks ago for our final SEC regular season affair so we have returned to the Knoxville Marriott and our usual routine. Our trip back on March 12 was a quick turnaround after a long road trip to Vanderbilt and Kentucky the weekend before. We arrived back at the courts from Lexington after 1am early Monday morning and then got back on the road two days later to face the Volunteers in a rare Thursday noon affair. We also added a match with Jacksonville State following the Tennessee match on our way home. So while this trip might have been shorter in terms of mileage it would require some high octane fuel in our tanks.
We had a light hit on Tuesday before traveling up on Wednesday and it was clear that a few of us were moving a little slower than usual including me. Be that as it may there were no additional days off and it was time to get after it again. That’s the beauty and the beast of college tennis. As the season goes on players grow more resilient from the constant training, competing, studying, resting and preparing from week to week. On the flip side there aren’t a lot of breaks during the schedule so it’s not possible to take two weeks off to freshen up…well, keep reading and you’ll see.
We came out firing against Tennessee which led to another doubles point victory, our 5th in a row and 7th out of the last 9 matches. We’ve seem to hit our stride again with doubles as it can be so critical in match play. Up 1-0, singles was tight with each team splitting first sets up and down the lineup. Like us, the Volunteers were relatively young and had experienced several close matches throughout the year. It was definitely a tug of war with the red ribbon on the rope moving in each team’s direction. Spencer put another point on the board for the Tide while the Vols put up three. Zhe was closing out his match serving 5-2 in the third set while Edson was on serve 4-5 in the third. Clearly this was going to be a nail biter as heads turned back and forth between courts 4 & 5. Zhe jumped ahead 40-15 and looking to even the match at 3-3 while Edson was battling. In the end it was Tennessee that won a deuce point on Edson’s court to close out the match for the home team. It was a valiant effort by our freshman from Chihuahua and now we needed to get on the road to Jacksonville.
We arrived in time for a 7 p.m. first serve against the Gamecocks. We proceeded to win the doubles point again which definitely helped carry momentum into the singles portion of the day. Alexey, Thibault and Zhe were victorious as was Edson, who fittingly was the last match on before we stopped play. Jacksonville State had four courts with lights so we abandoned Spencer and Ritchie’s matches (which had just begun) and continued our trek home. We rolled into Tuscaloosa shortly after midnight but this time our break would appear.
Since the Tennessee/Jacksonville State trip we had Easter weekend off (my first in 22 years of college coaching) and then an additional weekend off as our SEC Champs were pushed back a week this year. Definitely a much needed and deserved respite but now we’re back where we started two weeks ago…Knoxville, Tennessee. We face Vanderbilt in the first round of the SEC Champs and look forward to another opportunity against the Commodores. We had them against the ropes back in early April before they snuck out of the corner and recorded a 4-3 victory. That memory is rather fresh in our players’ minds and no doubt will serve as extra motivation.
So join us in person in Rocky Top by following online. Click here to go to the championship central page. First serve is set for Wednesday morning at 10am EST. As I said before college tennis has its beauty and its beast. The beauty in that we are playing after some solid rest and preparation…the beast in that it’s tournament time and the madness has begun. That’s the SEC and that’s Bama.
Roll Tide!
George