You probably don’t know it, but the women’s tennis team is 11-0. Head coach Lynn Imergoot’s squad just may be the best team you don’t know about at Washington University.
WU garnered a number 14 national ranking following the fall portion of its schedule and has only strengthened their case in the last month. Victories over Luther College and Kenyon College, two teams that handed the Bears tough defeats last year, epitomize the upward rise of the squad.
The Bears beat up on the Stars of Stephens College on Wednesday afternoon in quick fashion. The Bears won all nine matches (six singles and three doubles) at home on Wednesday to improve to 11-0 on the year.
The most amazing part of the contest, however, was not just that the Bears took every match, but that they only lost one game total.
Kacie Cook, the Bears’ number-one singles player managed to squeak by Breca Tracey, 6-1, 6-0. The one game Cook lost in the first set was the only game the Bears lost in all nine matches. The win for the Bears is their eleventh straight, and in their last four contests the Bears have won 35 out of 36 matches.
As the Bears climb in the national tennis rankings, however, Imergoot cautions the team about losing its hunger and focus.
“We can’t get to complacent,” said Imergoot. “Being 11-0 is great, but who you beat counts, too.”
Although the Bears have faced some cakewalks this year, there are also a few top-notch opponents who they have beaten. Aside from Kenyon and Luther, WU also destroyed rival DePauw University at home on March 15, 9-0.
The annual spring break trip to southern California also proved a successful endeavor as the Bears knocked off Cal State-Los Angeles, University of the Redlands, and Kenyon while soaking up some rays.
Yet the 27 years of experience possessed by Imergoot lend her a wisdom to temper success with modesty. Keeping things in perspective and making sure players maintain the right attitude are essential to Imergoot.
“This is a marathon, not a sprint,” she said. “We have to realize that the challenge of our schedule comes at the end.”
Coaching tennis matches is a much different challenge than coaching a basketball or volleyball game. Other than the warmup jacket, the main difference lies in the fact that there are nine tennis matches going on at once, and each is just as important as the next.
In Wednesday’s match the Bears simply overpowered an outmatched Stephens College team from Columbia, so a large amount of coaching was not as necessary. However, in closer matches the challenge proves difficult.
“If a player is coasting, winning 3-love or 4-love, then I won’t say much, I’ll just make sure she stays focused,” says Imergoot. “However, in a close match, I’ll watch for about five minutes and then give some advice.”
“You’d be surprised how much you can see in a match by just watching one game. It also helps to have assistants or even parents watching a match because then I can just ask them what’s going on. All the help really helps.”
Imergoot also attributes some of the success of the 2001-02 team to its cohesiveness. It is possible to have a team that doesn’t get along well but succeeds because, for example, the number three singles player does not need to work with the number one singles player to win her own match. Yet team unity seemed to be in no short supply on Wednesday as team members enthusiastically cheered one another on.
“Although hypothetically you could have a successful team that didn’t like each other, the cohesiveness of our team helps us work harder in practice, which makes us all better,” said Imergoot, “Very rarely, will you find a team without cohesiveness that lives up to their potential.”
Difficult matches loom on the horizon for WU, including a pair of Saturday affairs in Memphis against Rhodes College and Hendrix College.
Yet right now, the Bears women’s tennis team has lived up to their potential, exceeding expectations along the way. However, as the team well knows, it’s going to be a long marathon.
Contact Matt at [email protected].