Idaho men’s and women’s tennis opened up its season last week after being on a two-month hiatus.
The men’s tennis team is led by head coach Daniel Hangstefer. He became head coach last year and is the fifth head coach in program history.
Hangstefer is an experienced head coach with his most recent run of success being with Ferris State University in the 2017-18 season, posting a record of 21-3 and undefeated in conference play. Hangstefer led the team to win the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference regular-season and tournament.
Hangstefer will be leading a young and inexperienced Vandal squad this year as it is mostly comprised of freshmen with one sophomore and three seniors.
“I don’t feel like my expectations would change based on whether we have a majority of freshmen,” Hangstefer said. “We are going to have high standards for our team and the high standard for this team is that we come to practice ready to go every day, that we come prepared and that we work hard and smart.”
Seniors Bence Da Re, Esteban Santibanez and Guilherme Scarpelli will have to take on leadership roles to guide the young core to success this season.
“I do expect the seniors to be leaders. I spend a lot of time with the seniors by meeting with them and communicating with them about what it means to be a leader,” Hangstefer said.
The Vandals started the season on the road with matches against the University of Utah and Utah State University. They lost against Utah 7-0 to open up the season, but they did not leave the state empty-handed, beating USU 5-2 to secure their first win of the season.
Hangstefer’s squad travels to Portland this Saturday to face off against the University of Portland and their first home match is on Feb. 7 against Lewis-Clark State College.
“We had our first official practice and you could tell they had been training, getting ready and working hard,” Hangstefer said. “You’ve got to have that trust between the player and the coach, that the coach is going to do everything he can to push the guys and the coach is going to have to trust the player that they are going to take care of business off the court.”
The Vandals will have hurdles to overcome being a young team, playing in a tough conference and with the season just beginning, they will be continuously tested in the coming months.
“We want the fans, alumni and the campus to know that we want to represent them very well by how we do in the classroom, how we participate in the community and how we compete on the court,” Hangstefer said.
On the other side of Vandal tennis, the women’s team will look to continue the success they had last season by winning the Big Sky Championship. They fell short last season to Northern Arizona 4-0 in the title match.
Vandal Women’s Tennis huddles up before a big match against Washington State.
Courtesy | Vandal Athletics
The Vandals are led by head coach Babar Akbar and juniors Marta Magalhaes and Laura Spataro. Akbar is entering his fourth season with the Vandals and has 17 years of coaching experience.
Last season Magalhaes recorded a 9-1 conference record and Spataro was 8-1, both earned Big Sky All-Conference honors. The Vandals are five-time conference champions and were named third in the pre-season Big Sky coaches poll right behind Northern Arizona and Weber State.
“For me, this is a very different experience than we’ve had the last few years with a whole new team dynamic. We’ve got new leaders and new faces,” Akbar said. “We are third in the poll and our job is to go out and work for every match in the regular season. We want to win the whole thing.”
The Vandals started the season going a few miles west to face off against Washington State University and fell to the Cougars 7-0. They return to action on Jan. 31, as they face off against Brigham Young University in Pullman, Washington.
The Vandals will look to continue their success from last season with most of their team returning and only two freshman newcomers. With a loss to start the season, the Vandals will look to bounce back and improve their game with the concept of pressure in practice.
“Pressure, the big thing we are trying to do in practice is to develop a habit with dealing with pressure,” Akbar said. “I’ve got four kids returning who won the Big Sky Championship, they know what it takes to win and we are trying to get the other kids to understand that the pressure that’s on you to keep playing and performing at your best, is not easy to recreate in practice.”
The Vandals look to get more exposure this season with having more fans come to support the team and showing them what Vandal tennis can achieve.
“Just come out and watch if you get a chance, if you see a kid with a Vandal tennis shirt just stop them and tell them you’ve read about them,” Akbar said. “Those things make a big difference, the athletes would really appreciate some sort of connection with other students, alumni and other people who follow tennis.”
Armin Mesinovic can be reached at arg-sports.uidaho.edu