Given all the success it enjoyed in the fall and the hard work and commitment it showed during offseason winter training, the women's tennis team has a lot to look forward to when the spring portion of the season kicks off Monday.
Competition in September and October for the Jumbos yielded some key achievements that the squad hopes to build on as it takes on the bulk of its season opponents -- including a slew of NESCAC foes -- as the No. 11-ranked team in the country, according to the latest poll. Those achievements include a pair of dual-match wins over NYU and MIT; the ITA Small College National Championships doubles crown, courtesy of the top duo of junior captain Meghan McCooey and sophomore Julia Browne; and a singles title for Browne at the ITA New England Championships.
And with a few key absences, including veteran players senior Mari Homma and junior Erica Miller, who were both abroad in the fall, the young freshmen on the team benefited from having their fair share of time on court in both individual tournaments and inter-team matches. But now with a full lineup and winter workouts having been completed, the squad reflected positively on its offseason exertions.
"I think the offseason training went really well," Browne said. "As a team, we worked really hard on getting in better physical shape. We worked with a trainer three times a week and practiced playing tennis the other days as well as running on our own, and we even cross-trained along with swimming ... we're definitely seeing an improvement in these first few weeks of practice."
"Everyone was dedicated and showing up to the conditioning and the training sessions and working really hard, and I think it showed in our tennis when we started playing this season," McCooey said. "You could just tell that we as a team were a lot faster, a lot stronger on the court."
Given the continuing emphasis placed on the doubles component of a dual match -- the three doubles matches are played before singles players take court -- and the necessity of honing sound tennis strategy when playing with a partner, the Jumbos spent a substantial amount of time sorting out potential pairings.
"We definitely focused a lot on doubles because everything that you practice for in doubles can only help you in singles," McCooey said. "At the same time, it's a very different game ... We wanted to focus on that because it's such a crucial part of every match if you can go up [in the match score] after doubles."
"We did a lot of work in the offseason as a team," Browne added. "We worked a lot on volleys and overheads as the key shots in doubles, and we spent a lot of time in doubles these first few weeks because it's three points out of the match and it really sets the momentum ... We have a lot of good combinations that we're going to be trying out over spring break and then throughout the season, so it looks like it's going to be good."
One of the larger questions during the offseason was whether Browne and McCooey -- a duo that had proven itself to be one of the best in the country in the autumn -- would continue to team up or whether coach Kate Bayard would split the two up to provide more depth for the doubles lineup. As of now, it appears that Browne and McCooey will at least start off the spring season as partners.
"Coach just told us that at least for the first couple matches we are going to play together, but it's always up for changing around," Browne said. "We love playing with each other -- we did really well in the fall, our game styles match up, our personalities match up -- but we have to consider the other two teams and see if playing us separately would possibly make the other teams stronger."
"Both of us are willing to play with whoever," she continued. "We know that Coach is going to make the lineup based on what's best for the whole team, but as of right now we are going to be playing together, so we're really excited about that."
While the lineup in both singles and doubles has yet to be solidified, the Jumbos are glad to have both Homma and Miller back in their ranks because of both their talent and the leadership role they fill for the freshmen as upperclassmen. Indeed, the team expects to benefit greatly in terms of depth up and down the ladder.
"In the fall we had a lot of depth and we had some good freshmen come in and now, with Mari and Erica back, our whole team is together, so we are looking pretty strong right now," McCooey said. "Obviously they're both really solid players, but also having all their experience on the court, there are some things that you can only gain from a lot of matches, so it will be great to have a couple more upperclassmen for the freshmen to look up to."
"Coach doesn't really discuss the lineup with us, but we've been playing each other a lot in practice matches and there's a lot of depth and a lot of people who are close to each other who would probably play similar spots, so down the lineup it's going to be Coach's decision," Browne said.
Before jumping into its conference schedule, the squad will start off with three matches in as many days during a spring break trip to Florida, beginning with Div. I University of Rhode Island Monday -- a squad that swept the Jumbos 7-0 last year during the same trip -- followed by Div. II Palm Beach Atlantic Tuesday and Johns Hopkins the next day. After spending several months training and playing indoors, the transition to outside play will prove a challenge for the team.
"It is really going to be difficult for us to adjust from playing in Gantcher to playing outside, especially because the Gantcher courts are extremely fast, and when we go outside we're going to play one match on clay which will be very different for most of us," Browne said. "There's going to be wind and sun and heat and all the things we don't have in Gantcher, so we're all going to have to adjust to the conditions ... but I think the whole point is to get us more match-tough so when we come back and play more matches throughout the season, we'll have those under our belt."
Besides the obvious goal of trying to defeat the opposition during this trip in their final tune-up before taking on the fearsome competition offered by the NESCAC, the Jumbos will look to put all that they gained and learned during the winter into action.
"We definitely want to be focusing on doubles a lot; we've spent so much time on doubles that it would be great to see some results with all the work we put into it," McCooey said. "As far as singles, we're going to have to adjust to the outdoor weather because we've been playing in Gantcher during the entire offseason ... so we're going to have to stay in the point and get some consistency back playing outdoors since points will be a lot longer, but there's no reason why we can't be positive about beating any team down here."
