Men’s tennis spring season starts today

The UTRGV Men’s Tennis Team opens the season against No. 5 ranked Texas Christian University at 6 p.m. today, a match head coach Nathan Robinson and the players have been looking forward to facing all year long. 

“One of the best teams in the country,” said tennis freshman Sam Whitehead. “So, it would be good to see how we compare, and it will be a great experience.” 

After his first semester at the helm, Robinson said the team is ready to build on the fall season and compete for the spring.

“There’s always a learning curve with that,” he said about his first head coaching job. “But it was good just to kind of get down here, get settled, get on the court with the guys, and then, you know, start to try to, you know, build the program in the right direction.” 

The first-year head coach said from day one he wanted to focus on bringing a positive energy to the team, making sure everyone improves and gaining the trust of the team. 

He said being able to focus on all these things in a professional manner puts the team on the correct track of moving forward.  

“From communication, to how we handle things in the weight room, to how we handle things with the training staff, to how we handle things on the court, you know, how we handle things in the classroom–these are all important aspects that if we handled it professionally, then nothing really can surprise us at that point in time,” Robinson said. 

Getting the trust of a team for new coaches is paramount and is the most important thing, Robinson said.

“We’ve had long conversations, you know, in meetings, on drives and things like that,” he said. “We’ve talked through these things and that was really important for us to just help gain that growth, helped gain that trust, and I think we’re in a really good place that way.” 

Whitehead said he is excited to get things going for the spring season after training hard during the fall season. 

Asked for his thoughts on Robinson’s first semester with the team, Whitehead replied, “I thought it was really good. He put expectations on us on how he wants us to perform, how he wants us to train and I feel like we did a good job over the fall in improving as a team.”  

The Vaqueros competed in three tournaments this fall, starting at the Contender Crossfit Islander Open in Corpus Christi, where senior Carlo Izurieta and junior Misha Kvantaliani won the Flight A Doubles Championship. They also competed at the UTSA Roadrunner invite before closing the fall season at the ITA Regionals in College Station. 

Robinson said the fall competitions helped him get to know the guys and what needs to be worked on. 

Huge strides were made from a mental standpoint for the team last fall, he said. 

“The mental capacity to sit in these longer, tougher rallies, or to trust in your game style a little better because everybody on the team has a different mentality and how they want to play,” Robinson said.  “And that goes down to even physiological sides.” 

With some players being not as tall, their game style will focus on being faster, quicker and to grind out a longer game, he said. With the taller players, they will focus more on hitting the ball harder and playing shorter matches. Whatever the style of play is, Robinson wants his players to have a mindset of performing at the highest level at all times.

Junior Te Kani Williams said he is also excited to get the season going, especially with COVID-19 limiting games the last two years. 

Williams said fitness was the biggest thing for him to work on in the fall season. 

“Really working on my conditioning, getting fit, losing weight and secondly, match play,” he said. “I was injured for a lot of the first semester. So, trying to get matches in before we play will always be helpful.” 

Robinson said getting in better shape, putting time in the weight room and putting time out on the court was another big step for the team. 

“The team, as of January, definitely beats the team in August,” he said. 

Asked what are the expectations for the team, Robinson replied, “From a win-loss perspective, that’s really tough to say … but what I do expect from the team this year is that whenever we play a match, that we will be the most competitive team.”

Today’s competition will be followed by matches at 3 p.m. Thursday in Lubbock against Texas Tech University, who also received national votes. 

UTRGV will be on the road for much of the season as the Vaqueros only have three home matches: against Texas A&M Corpus Christi on Feb. 15, The University of the Incarnate Word on Feb. 18 and the New Jersey Institute of Technology March 15. 

“I think it’s a very competitive schedule,” Robinson said. “You know, we have a lot of just toss-up matches where it’s gonna be, you know, who’s competing harder that day, who’s working harder that day, who’s more focused.” 

Whitehead said he encourages UTRGV students to support them at home games, which will help them. 

“I think with this team, you know, we’re really close,” Williams said. “I think the chemistry is there, which is essential … wanting to do better for the guy that’s standing next to you.”