The St. Joe’s club tennis team experienced the full spectrum of tournament play in its first United States Tennis Association Middle States Sectionals tournament. Despite dropping the first two rounds against Drexel and Penn State, the team rallied and beat Temple club tennis with three wins in a strong team performance.
Sophomores Peter Sanchez and Elijah Quan, president and vice president of the club, respectively, took their leadership positions just this year. As a first-year-heavy team, the team’s goal was to compete to the best of its level, even though a lot of its players have not played a match in a while.
“We were still shaking off some of those cobwebs,” Sanchez said. “For a lot of people, it’s their first time competing in a while.”
Specifically, one St. Joe’s player stood out in the match against Drexel and throughout the overall tournament. Sophomore Ethan Kaligis carried the team to multiple match wins and tie-breakers.
“What made me successful is that even though I wasn’t really confident in my shots, I made the margins a little bit bigger and continued to try to move around, play good defense,” Kaligis said.
After some defeats and close matches against Penn State and Drexel, the team moved onto the second day of competition against Temple. The only expectation was to eliminate the nerves and play free.
“We just got inside their heads,” Sanchez said. “We were going for shots that we wouldn’t normally do during a match, and we’re hitting them.”
The Hawks kept mistakes to a minimum. Men’s doubles had a commanding 6-1 win in the individual matches, and women’s doubles followed up with a strong performance, but ultimately lost to Temple 5-6 in a tiebreak. Kaligis won his singles match 6-5 in a tiebreak, and mixed doubles took a 6-3 win.
Although the Hawks dropped its final match against Delaware, the team is taking all the highs from this tournament into future ones. Leadership felt very confident in their performance overall, overcoming adversity and coming out strong. Quan said team morale is one of the biggest assets for the team.
“Have fun,” Quan said. “Go out there and enjoy yourself.”
The Hawks will play more tournaments throughout the year and look forward to working hard and incorporating what they learned from the recent tournament.
