Nov. 25, 2008

By Head Women's Tennis Coach Hilary Somers

USF women's tennis winds down the fall season, in fact, we had our last timed monthly mile this morning at 6:30 am at the Kezar track. Through the fog, USF women's tennis records were broken. Cecilia Gratian broke our best women's tennis mile time with a 5:59 mile time this morning. Our most improved on the mile this fall goes to Cecilia as well as she improved her mile time by 36 seconds this fall. I guess all the training is paying off. Yes, she even runs to class. I am happy to say everyone improved their mile times by at least 21 seconds this fall. Now, we just hope they can sustain their times come January after finals and Christmas break.

Highlights of the Fall Season

USF Women's Tennis was awarded the Carmen Cox Award this year. It is given to a sports team at USF based on community service, GPA, and on court performance.

We participated in a Breast Cancer Awareness exhibition event and barbeque hosted at Pacific Athletic Club in October. The very next day we played in a Pro-Am and had a lunch at the Golden Gateway Swim and Tennis Club to celebrate their 40th Anniversary. Yes, the free meals really help with the budget, and the girls are very good about taking home any of the leftovers.

Jennifer-Lee Heinser had a great showing at the Saint Mary's Invitational where she lost in the finals of the tournament to a top player from UC Berkeley. The lesson of the day learned by Coach Hilary - No speeding on Moraga Way. The cops love to get the radar out there, even at 7 am on a Sunday morning. J There is not even anyone up in Moraga at that time!!

Heinser earned a precious spot at the All American Tournament held at the Riviera Resort in Pacific Palisades where she had a great win over the #1 player from University of Denver in 3 tight sets and then had a tough loss to a top player from Florida State just 2 hours later. It is a great tournament. The players get housed at private residences and the coaches stay at the Riviera Resort.

Heinser got to the quarterfinals of the ITA Regionals at Stanford with a huge win over a Cal player, a Stanford player, and University of Washington's #1 player before falling to Cal's #1 player.

Cecilia Gratian, playing #1 singles for the Dons for the first time last weekend for our final fall event at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, stepped up and beat the #1 player from UC Santa Barbara.

Jessy Mekpoh played #2 singles all weekend for the Dons in San Luis Obispo and came up with two great wins against UCSB and Santa Clara (we always love a win over the Broncos.)

We got a free lunch at Mondeo Pronto, a wraps place in SLO, because their credit card machine went down just as we had ordered. That made our day!!! Free lunch for the entire team???

Mekpoh was selected to represent the USF student athletes at the NCAA Student Leadership Convention in San Diego in October.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! I know I will be giving thanks for all the wonderful student athletes I am so fortunate to help become better people and better tennis players every day. I think I will have an extra piece of apple pie for that.