By Alex Mackall
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After a week of relaxing and vacationing, the women’s tennis team must come back following spring break ready to play. The team, who lost in state last season to Columbus North is looking to come back with a vengeance this season, despite the loss of six of their seven varsity players and the addition of a new assistant coach.

Varsity player and junior Mikaela Carlson said, “(To have another successful year,) we just decided that this season, we are going to keep all of our practices more intense and focused on tennis and that we are just going to have positive attitudes about everything because that’ll just determine a lot. If you don’t have a positive attitude about things, you tend to get stressed more and you get more nervous about stuff.”

Carlson says that a large part of forming a successful team out of a group of less experienced players is being able to work as one unit. She said, “We just all need to support each other a lot. I think we’ve been really good at that this year. Like just at practice and everything, we’ve been really supportive of each other. And during tryouts, there’s always competition of who is going to play what, but we’ve been pretty good about not letting that get to us.”
Head Coach Sharon Rosenburgh said she is excited to see what the new and younger players bring to the table this year, but said she also thinks that its what the team does as a whole that really matters.
She said, “We have many underclassman who are returning and excited and proud to be a legacy of those before them. All players are to watch. This is an individual sport, with a team aspect. The team must win enough points to win the match. Each player contributes valuable energy to the team results. In an individual sport, working on the team aspect is very important. All players play for everyone else. That play is respected and trusted.”
According to Carlson, another change the team must adapt to this season is a new assistant coach after former Assistant Coach Jenny Burger left at the end of last season. However, Carlson said this adjustment will be easy because the new Assistant Coach Carl Mower has been around the team for a while having been a volunteer coach in past seasons. Carlson said, “It’s nice because he’s much more involved now with the team. He’s a really good coach.”

Despite all of the changes, Rosenburgh says she expects nothing less than the best from her team. She said, “Our expectations are always high. You must believe that you can develop into a formidable team. This takes working on skills and confidence. You should expect to see players who are proud to be on CHS girls tennis team, and will compete competitively throughout the state.”

The team began conditioning in early January. The conditioning consisted of two to three weekly session. They included running and basic drills to improve quickness and strength so that the team will have a greater advantage.
Rosenburgh said, “This is the only 2011 that we all have. This team is excited to play. They plan to continue on with our team comes first tradition. We are proud to represent Carmel High School.