New faces are leading the way for the Dartmouth men's and women's tennis teams as they kick-off their respective Fall seasons.
On the men's side, Christopher Drake took over as head coach for the Big Green after long-time head coach Charles Kinyon retired at the end of last season. Drake, a former Brown University tennis player and Northwestern University coach, said he has had a hectic few months, but is enjoying his new position.
"The past couple of months have been great, but it has been really busy," Drake said. "My wife and I just had a baby five weeks ago, we just now are getting settled in Hanover, and we've been working hard with preseason practices. I'm doing well and the team is doing well. I am pushing them quite a bit over the first few weeks, but overall, we're really happy."
Throughout the preseason, the Dartmouth men, led by their new coach, have been working on getting back into shape and getting ready for the team's upcoming season.
"We're getting guys back in shape," Drake said. "We hit a lot of balls. We're making sure the guys get their timing back and are ready to be competitive. I have stressed being fit and competitive, and we are hoping that it will pay off."
Although the Big Green have not had a team competition, individual players have already had success this season. Alexander Centenari '13 beat three Harvard University athletes at the Campus Showdown in Cambridge, Mass., over the weekend.
"It was really great to go down and compete with some great athletes," Centenari said. "It was also a great opportunity to check out some of our competition and see what they've done over the summer and how they're playing."
Dartmouth officially kicks off its Fall season this weekend, competing in the National Tennis Center Invitational in New York City. The team, however, is looking for more than just a win.
"This is going to be a great chance to see where we are," Drake said. "It's the first tournament, so it will not determine how our season will go by any means. I'm really looking for the guys to compete as well as they can. Win or lose, I'll be happy."
The Dartmouth women's team has also been hard at work during preseason. The team, along with head coach Robert Dallis and new assistant coach Dave Jones, has been focusing on fundamentals and is working to perfect the season's lineup.
"We start off every season fresh," Dallis said. "We don't really look at it as carryover from years past. We see it as a whole new year with a whole new group."
The Big Green women's team kicked off its season with a tournament at the University of Virginia over the weekend. Freshmen Melissa Matsuoka '14 and Rachel Decker-Sadowski '14 led the team with second and third place wins, respectively, in the "D" flight of the tournament.
"Both Melissa and Rachel came in with the idea of being ready to go and wanting to do well for Dartmouth," Dallis said. "They practiced hard all summer and worked a lot. When we got down to Virginia, in this tournament with highly ranked teams, I knew they would be able to compete." Although the freshmen played well, the tournament highlighted both the positive and the negative aspects of the team's game, Dallis added.
"I think that certainly we will need to continue to work on consistency," he said. "For a number of the players, we're going to have to identify and continue to work on what their game style is and how they want to play. Overall, I think we did pretty well. Our general fitness was good and the women did a good job of competing throughout the matches. Regardless of how things were going if they were doing well or poorly they made a conscious effort to make it difficult for their opponents."
The Big Green will make its next appearance at the All-American tournament from Oct. 2 - Oct. 10 at the Riviera Country Club.
