Proud Of Our Alumni!

Dear Coach,

As it is pretty much tradition for a graduated ATA player to send you an email about their first year in college, I decided to carry on the torch and let you know what was the most interesting and important about my freshman year at Notre Dame. First of all I just want to emphasize how amazing college life is. You have the absolute freedom to do whatever you want at whatever time you want with relatively few responsibilities. People often told me college was the best four years of their lives and now I understand what they meant by that.

I would like to start with the negative side of college first because the positives outweigh the negatives by a long shot. Personally, I didn’t know what to expect about the cold weather. As you might know South Bend Indiana is not exactly tropical. Even though I was absolutely mortified about the cold weather it really isn’t that bad. Unlike Texas (were one day might be 90 degrees and the next might go down to 30) you know it is going to cold and you are prepared for it. The snow is actually pretty, until it becomes dirty slush. The main problem I found was the fact that I had to dress and undress when I entered and exited every building because of the temperature change (it was a pain). The other part of college that I was scared about was how challenging it might have been. I thought that because I am probably at the lower end of my class’ SAT score, I was going to struggle; yet I found that the hard part is getting in this type of “prestigious” schools, because once you are in, it is very possible to be successful if you work hard. (I was surprised how incredibly unmotivated some college kids can be). Sleep was definitely another issue in college. I was used to sleeping at least 8 hours every night throughout my high school career; yet loud roommates, heavy workload nights, tests and weekend nights do not allow you such luxury. Personally I have gotten used to the lack of sleep by recharging batteries when possible, either with short naps or sleeping in on weekends.

Finally, as a tennis player, there are a few difficulties one has to learn how to cope of before being successful. One, you have to learn how to balance (and it is not the same for everybody) between your academics, tennis, and social life. These three are very important in college therefore you have to make sure you do enough of all keeping your priorities straight. It is obvious (at least for me) that school comes first, then tennis then tour social life therefore you have to make decisions every single day having in mind how it will affect you. It is very possible to make time for studying hard, training hard and going out and making friends and the key lies in Jack Newman’s favorite two words “time management”. I see people, who do not play sports, do not join clubs, do not study and don’t even go out and it seems like their days go faster than mine. As long as you know your limits, you can be very successful and I am grateful that the ATA has instilled such values in me that have allowed me to have a successful freshmen year.

What I really want to say is that the people who told me college is the best time of your life were probably right, yet they were usually not part of a TEAM. Playing and being part of a college team is by far the greatest part of college even though it can be hard and frustrating at times, it is very while worth it. Even though I saw little playing I was still able to make a huge impact on the team. I was probably on the hardest workers in the team if not the hardest working and a leader on and of the court and I was told these both my coach and my teammates. Even though I didn’t play much I feel people worked harder and got better because I was part of the team, therefore I take a lot of pride on our results and our round of sixteen finish at NCAA’s.

I would like to therefore thank you for giving me the opportunity to be in this kind of environment and giving me the tools to succeed and have the “best 4 years of my life.”

With much gratitude,

Your student and friend Santiago Montoya

Dear ATA,

I just came from Durham North Carolina where I played my first couple rounds of the NCAA tournament. Luckily Boise State was also chosen to play at Duke, so I got to see Brent Werbeck play. We both experienced College tennis moments that I know we live and train for everyday and I just wanted to share them with you.

I played my first match on Friday against University of Alabama. After playing them early on in the season, the team knew that it was going to be a tough match. Starting out strong with a lot of energy, I won the first set 6-2. As the momentum started to shift, my opponent won the second set 6-3.

I went down pretty quickly in the third 3-0 and then looked over at one of my teammates win a great point and she looked over at me and said, “Lets go UVA, come on Lindsey.” I told myself that there was no way I was going to walk off the court without giving every point everything that I had. After some time, other matches had finished and the team was winning 3-2 with only Caroline (line 6) and I playing for the last point. I rallied back to 3-3 with the help of Brent cheering with all his Boise State teammates in the back of my court. That was when I had a flashback of Texas Cup. I had my teammates on the sideline, Brent in the back of the court screaming “LINDSEY P,” and then the random cheering from the rest of the crowd.

Soon after, my teammate lost her match and it was now down to me. I had to be the one to take the team to the next round. I knew I had my opponent where I wanted her at 3-3, until I fell on the ground in the back of the court and jammed my foot. She was getting tired and I felt like an injury timeout would have been more beneficial for her than for me, so I brushed it off and just dealt with the pain. I rallied back to 5-5 playing tough and making her fight for every point. I lost the next game but then fought to bring it into a 3rd set breaker. I went down 0-3 and 3-5, but knew in my mind that if I had to hit 100 balls these next 4 points I was going to do it. And I did, I played another 4 long points and won them all to advance UVA to the round of 32 against Duke.

The feeling was amazing. Those were the moments that I live for in tennis. I knew that all my hard work the last 10 years of my life- the morning workouts, the lessons, the practice everyday, the off court time and the specifics that I put into all of these were the reasons that allow me to experience special moments like the one that I had on Friday.

The following day, I had the opportunity to watch Brent do the same thing for his team and it made me even more proud. Brent and I trained together for four years at ATA and saw each other day in and day out put in the work to get to where we are today. We may not be at the top of our team’s lineup- but we get the job done at lines 5 and 6, advancing our teams to the next round, and enjoying every bit of it.

Good Luck with everything and keep working hard!!!!