By: Matt Hill, Head Coach
At the very beginning of the season in August, we felt good about the kids coming in. However, recruiting for this year was a bit difficult because when you want to be one of the better teams in the country, you need the entire team to be very strong. That's hard to do in a one-year time frame because there's not that many good players at that level coming into college in a single year. We hope to get one or two good players every year and we were trying to put together six to eight.
When you remove the United States because most kids were already committed, it hurts. It's one less group of top players to pull from to help you get to that number. We were also recruiting without much of a recent history. The majority of kids were a bit apprehensive and had reservations, but then you had a couple kids who were really excited about what was going on and thought that this could be something special and they could help build it. We lost kids to schools like Oklahoma and USC because they wanted to go to a school that was top-5 or top-10 and they wanted to know what they were getting, and they didn't know what they were getting with us.
Moving into the fall, Ben did great with his win at the ITA Southwest Regional. That's not an easy event to win when you've got USC and UCLA there and really strong players in California. While it was great to have some success in the fall, we were experienced enough to know that it was one guy winning a point in a team match, not six. But it was really exciting to see some success there early.
Come January, there were a lot of question marks that we didn't have answers to. A lot of guys weren't eligible in the fall and we hadn't seen them compete. It was some of their first matches in live competition since the summer. There was a lot more uncertainty than what I was used to.
We started the year 0-3 with losses against some of the top teams, and it affected me differently than the guys. It didn't shake me one bit. I knew they could compete with those teams or I wouldn't have scheduled them.
For the guys, they really wanted to show right away that they belonged in that group. Not picking up one of those wins really hurt them more than what I expected. It motivated them, but had we gotten over the hump with one of those teams early in the year, it would have helped more internally.
We hosted the ASU Invitational after those two weekends, and the guys did a nice job rebounding that next match. We started playing better tennis slowly and worked together as a team. We then won a really strong tournament at the Blue Gray Tennis Classic through beating Alabama, who was a Sweet 16 team this year, in front of a big Alabama crowd.
We hit a bit of a bump in conference play, but some things happened to us during the year that we didn't plan. We lost two players mid-March, and when you don't have the depth to begin with, we knew we were in trouble. We could still beat teams that were 25-50 in the country, but when you're playing so many of the top-10 teams short-handed, you're putting yourself in a tough spot.
We had No. 4 Ohio State on the ropes without two of our guys in March, and that team was in the finals of the NCAA tournament. I was really impressed with our effort and competitiveness. We then beat a very good Oregon team at their home and we played well. We didn't play as well against Washington when we lost six first sets, but we came back and found a way to win. Those are moments that you sit there and see the heart and grit the team has to get through these moments. Come May, we had the tournament in our sights.
At the end of the day, we didn't even have players less than 12 months ago. It really hit me when I was there with Michaël for singles and we were at the meeting before the tournament started where they release the draws. I was sitting there looking around the room at so many coaches that I've known for the years and respected and I was thinking "He didn't make the tournament with his team, neither did he," and it made me think here I was beating myself up because we're not where I wanted to be.
The more removed I've gotten from it, the more I've realized what an accomplishment it was to make it this year with a group of guys that half didn't play in the fall and one just got here in January. We were really pleased. We have huge goals here, and that rings true with every coach at this university right now.
We're really excited for our years to come. We've set an amazing foundation and we've got some amazing kids coming in next year. It's just going to get strong and stronger, particularly with the internal leadership piece. They know what to expect and they're going to get fall competition under their belt.
Overall, I'm very excited about next year. I told the guys after we lost that Baylor in the NCAAs that normally I'd be so upset right now. I'd need a few days. We sat in the visiting locker room at Texas A&M and I said that I couldn't tell you how excited I am for the next few years. I think Sun Devil Nation, our alumni and fans are going to be really pleased. If they enjoyed the matches and the level this year, it's just going to get stronger.
At the very beginning of the season in August, we felt good about the kids coming in. However, recruiting for this year was a bit difficult because when you want to be one of the better teams in the country, you need the entire team to be very strong. That's hard to do in a one-year time frame because there's not that many good players at that level coming into college in a single year. We hope to get one or two good players every year and we were trying to put together six to eight.
When you remove the United States because most kids were already committed, it hurts. It's one less group of top players to pull from to help you get to that number. We were also recruiting without much of a recent history. The majority of kids were a bit apprehensive and had reservations, but then you had a couple kids who were really excited about what was going on and thought that this could be something special and they could help build it. We lost kids to schools like Oklahoma and USC because they wanted to go to a school that was top-5 or top-10 and they wanted to know what they were getting, and they didn't know what they were getting with us.
Moving into the fall, Ben did great with his win at the ITA Southwest Regional. That's not an easy event to win when you've got USC and UCLA there and really strong players in California. While it was great to have some success in the fall, we were experienced enough to know that it was one guy winning a point in a team match, not six. But it was really exciting to see some success there early.
Come January, there were a lot of question marks that we didn't have answers to. A lot of guys weren't eligible in the fall and we hadn't seen them compete. It was some of their first matches in live competition since the summer. There was a lot more uncertainty than what I was used to.
We started the year 0-3 with losses against some of the top teams, and it affected me differently than the guys. It didn't shake me one bit. I knew they could compete with those teams or I wouldn't have scheduled them.
For the guys, they really wanted to show right away that they belonged in that group. Not picking up one of those wins really hurt them more than what I expected. It motivated them, but had we gotten over the hump with one of those teams early in the year, it would have helped more internally.
We hosted the ASU Invitational after those two weekends, and the guys did a nice job rebounding that next match. We started playing better tennis slowly and worked together as a team. We then won a really strong tournament at the Blue Gray Tennis Classic through beating Alabama, who was a Sweet 16 team this year, in front of a big Alabama crowd.
We hit a bit of a bump in conference play, but some things happened to us during the year that we didn't plan. We lost two players mid-March, and when you don't have the depth to begin with, we knew we were in trouble. We could still beat teams that were 25-50 in the country, but when you're playing so many of the top-10 teams short-handed, you're putting yourself in a tough spot.
We had No. 4 Ohio State on the ropes without two of our guys in March, and that team was in the finals of the NCAA tournament. I was really impressed with our effort and competitiveness. We then beat a very good Oregon team at their home and we played well. We didn't play as well against Washington when we lost six first sets, but we came back and found a way to win. Those are moments that you sit there and see the heart and grit the team has to get through these moments. Come May, we had the tournament in our sights.
At the end of the day, we didn't even have players less than 12 months ago. It really hit me when I was there with Michaël for singles and we were at the meeting before the tournament started where they release the draws. I was sitting there looking around the room at so many coaches that I've known for the years and respected and I was thinking "He didn't make the tournament with his team, neither did he," and it made me think here I was beating myself up because we're not where I wanted to be.
The more removed I've gotten from it, the more I've realized what an accomplishment it was to make it this year with a group of guys that half didn't play in the fall and one just got here in January. We were really pleased. We have huge goals here, and that rings true with every coach at this university right now.
We're really excited for our years to come. We've set an amazing foundation and we've got some amazing kids coming in next year. It's just going to get strong and stronger, particularly with the internal leadership piece. They know what to expect and they're going to get fall competition under their belt.
Overall, I'm very excited about next year. I told the guys after we lost that Baylor in the NCAAs that normally I'd be so upset right now. I'd need a few days. We sat in the visiting locker room at Texas A&M and I said that I couldn't tell you how excited I am for the next few years. I think Sun Devil Nation, our alumni and fans are going to be really pleased. If they enjoyed the matches and the level this year, it's just going to get stronger.