Whew, when you are traveling and spending 24/7 with some of the most talented, intelligent, and ambitious collegian tennis stars....an old time tennis coach like me has got to fasten his seat belt to keep abreast of a journey like this.
Our National team of six of the top American college players have arrived to Rennes, France on Tuesday and this is the only first minute that I have been able to catch up to send the Homeland a report.
First and most important, our team consists of three women and three men whose primary goal is to bring the Master'U Championship Team Trophy back to the US soil for the sixth time in the past 7 years. Somehow, someway our American collegians have managed to do the impossible to dominate this tournament which consists of the top players from the world to win this prestigious event.
Our Jedi Warriors consist of:
Mackenzie McDonald (UCLA)
Austin Smith (Georgia)
Tom Fawcett (Stanford)
Brooke Austin (Florida)
Maegan Manasse (Cal)
Danielle Collins (Virginia).
The best and the brightest of American Collegiate Tennis!!
The Luke Skywalker and Princess Lea leading our tennis warriors into tennis battles at the toughest Team Collegiate tournament in the world is the unsinkable Cal Women's Tennis Coach Amanda Augustus who has led the Cal Bears to the pinnacle of women's tennis in her tenure at Cal. I will be joining Amanda as coach for my seventh straight year, and still find the heart a pumping and adrenaline still flowing throughout my body.
Our main goal is to use this trip and tournament as a golden pathway for the continued improvement of our players,and grow a seed that will constantly nourish our players love for this game an inspire them to pursue and excel at tennis on the professional career, as well as provide an exhilarating experience of playing for our country that will resonate in their lives and create an exciting future for them.
We hit the ground running when we landed into Rennes, France this Tuesday, after we arrived into Rennes, we started off our trip by going straight to the courts for a hit to prepare for the intensive battles that start on Friday. Only thought in our heads after our workouts the entire team After that is was straight to dinner...and then it was miraculous to see young collegians who right after dinner head straight to their hotel bed rooms to get some treasured sleep and shut eye. Usually College Students are burning the candles at both ends of the stick and staying up all night. Its amazing to see the power of a red eye flight that gets young people to jump into bed right after dinner.
Yesterday and today was full of team practices, team meals, team meetings, team games and team building and bonding. The most important part of these past two days was basically providing an environment of camaraderie, intensive training, and non stop team competition for our Stupendous Six. This is most definitely Family Building time.
As our USTA Tshirts state across our chests, we are "All In".
Practices have been sizzling (for these players to practice with their elite level peers from across the nation is like going to a Music Festival and singing with all the Music Greats (think of Rolling Stones, Led Zepplin, Taylor Swift), and any other favorites) on stage for five days in France. You can't beat that, and our players are taking advantage of this.
Tonight, we went to the draw ceremony and learned our destiny for the title. Due to our Championships for the past four years, we were seeded #1. Our first match is against an always a talented and lethal Great Britain team. If we get by them tomorrow, we will play the winner of #3 Germany vs. Ireland.
As I mentioned, we are strapped in for an intensive rocket ship launch into non stop team matches till Sunday evening with the World Championship at stake. Can't think of anything better.
Most importantly, the best part of this trip besides the world class tennis is the opportunity to make friends with players from the 7 participating nations as well as the fantastic French tennis officials and staff who are putting on this world class team event which will draw humungous crowds of French Tennis Fans.
Photo is of USA team with our British competitors after we learned that were playing each other. the other photo is of our Danielle Collins who won our 1 point tournament at practice today and accepting the lavish worship from her teammates. Check out the draw and results on the USTA.com site!!
Go USA!!
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Greg Patton
Boise State Men's Tennis Coach
1910 University Dr
Boise, ID 83725
cell 208 484-2432
WAC Tennis Champions 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Big West Tennis Champions 1997, 1999, 2000
Big Sky Tennis Champions 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996