Chapter Three: Flesh and Blood

Previous Chapters
Sweat and Hope
Widening Our Nets

A successful season rides on a lot of things that don't involve tennis. As mentioned in the previous chapters about 2010, there is a need for hard work, hope, and for relationships. A successful team is defined by a whole range of characteristics, and needs leaders to hold them to their high standards. Forehands, backhands and serves are simply not enough.

So in 2010, we embarked on a devotional and motivational campaign to promote maturity. Maturity as defined by 2 Peter 1:5-8. It began here on the blog, and then continued through readings and meditations at tennis camp, then I kept coming back to these key words as we made our way through the season. Words like goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, and love.

Those qualities are needed in tennis. More than any sport I know, tennis requires these very Biblical values. And these qualities must be modeled, or we don't understand them. Jesus came to put flesh and blood to God, so that we might see and live. These qualities need flesh and blood as well, and going into 2010, we were blessed with leaders who brought them to life.

At the end of 2009, Seth Krabill was on a roll. He was demolishing every #2 singles opponent that he played, crushing people with an ease that was scary. At the same time, Ben Mast was struggling at #1 singles. And so late in the season, we switched. Seth took his confidence into the #1 singles position, and Ben fell to #2. It was clear in the offseason that the position would be up for grabs, and throughout the spring Ben and Seth battled back and forth. Ben would win in a tiebreak, Seth would win 7-5, then one then the other.

Then come 2010, Seth was squarely at #2. And it matters, because #2 singles can't advance in the state tournament (and most don't make All-District). But Seth never blinked an eyebrow. Seth accepted his new role, and embraced it. He was our sure point, and he never complained. Seth exhibited GOODNESS to everyone, because he was more concerned with the good of the whole team than himself.

And it's easy to say, but he actually sacrificed for the team. At the end of the year, Seth finished 20th on the All-District voting. Top 16 make the team. He was undefeated, he couldn't have done more. I guarantee had he played #1 singles, he would have made the team. He was good enough.

What is needed for success? A leader who is good.

Kyle Miller could be commended for the same thing. Despite being our best doubles player, Kyle could never find a partner who helped him become a dominant force at #1 doubles. Russell Klassen would have offered that possibility, but splitting our top doubles players allowed us to dominate #2 doubles. It was a tactical move to get us another point in each match, and Kyle understood. He sacrificed personal wins for team wins. And that is the sign of goodness.

But also of self-control. Having different partners, who didn't all try as hard as Kyle did, made Kyle increasingly frustrated. But Kyle controlled his emotions and left it on the court.

What is needed for success? A leader with self-control.

Which could also be said of Ben Mast. He was someone who seemed in control at all times while he played. He couldn't be shaken by a bad call, a strong serve, or his own bad play. Never with his head down, always working for the next point. I remember early in the season when he got down 0-2 against Goshen in our second match of the season. He didn't get down, he didn't hang his head, and instead stormed ahead to a convincing victory. Control. Ben was in control.

But he had to persevere to get to that position. He had to learn from difficulty. Like having the #1 position ripped away from him at the end of 2009. Playing #1 singles for 14 matches, he ended the season with 6 at #2 singles. And he struggled with that reality, actually losing 2 of those matches. But he had to overcome it entering 2010.

And so he put it out of mind and worked. He didn't sulk, he didn't complain, he persevered. At the end of the season, he had a reward. Not only the #1 singles position, but an 18-4 record and an All-District selection.

What is needed for success? A leader who perseveres.

And what was true of all of our leaders? They were devoted to BC tennis. Workouts, Saturdays, early mornings, tennis camp, prayer partners, overnights at the courts, new players, new friends, new doubles partners, freshman who were loud, freshman who were quiet, balls hit out of the court, countless miles after practice. They came back, and they came back each time with renewed passion and energy.

What is needed for success? Leaders who love.

The flesh and blood of 2010's success was it's leaders. They embodied the soul of the team. Goodness, self-control, perseverance, and love.

Chapter Two: Widening Our Nets

I tried to play football in middle school. Disastrous describes it most accurately, painful would be a close second. Once, when attempting a tackle on our man-child running back in practice, I caught my middle finger in the netting of his practice jersey and he dragged me 15 yards, by my finger, right into the end zone. I was terrible.

Well, I could memorize plays well, so all wasn't lost. But fourth-string quarterback of a 7th grade team isn't that illustrious of a position. So my dreams of football died quickly. By 8th grade I had decided to play tennis in high school.

My high school tennis coach, Tony Wright, was a self-taught lover of the game. He never played growing up, but learned the game as an adult and started the tennis program at Angola High School in the early 70's or late 60's when he started teaching Chemistry there. He had passion for the game.

Late in my career at Angola High School, Tony started letting me take control of the varsity singles players during our practice. This experience was a blast for me (although I do wonder how effective I was as a 18-year old coach). But I loved the game, and I passed that on to my younger brother. He eventually became a better player than me, majored in Sports Management at Taylor University, and began to help manage a tennis club in Greentown.

I went to college, and my coach, Stan King, introduced me to a whole host of new tennis players. Amadeo Marino, an Argentine with a fiery temper. Andrew Lanctot, a laid-back and cerebral player who won consistently against those more "physically" talented. I learned to know some of my opponents well: Matt Taylor, the coach's son from Taylor University, was my favorite because he was a serve and volleyer like my dear Pete Sampras!

Upon graduation, I met Dan Bodiker. He had called the college looking for a tennis coach and gotten my name from Stan King. He then called my uncle, who had attended Bethany and played soccer for Bod, to learn more about me before interviewing me for the job. When I showed up to interview, Bod had all the players sitting on the curb outside the gym to meet me. Before asking one question, he introduced me to "my" team.

Throughout the years, I've grown into a tennis scene, meeting more and more people. As my brother went to Taylor, I met his teammates and friends. As I coached, I began to know more of the opposing coaches, gained respect for many of them. Soon, players I played against in college were coaching against me at schools like Bremen, Goshen, Penn, and then Northridge. The network of people I knew kept widening and widening.

And this season, those nets came back to support us in a big way. When we needed a sign-off for Nate Brendle's transfer, I was able to talk to Evan Atkinson, Nate's coach at Northridge and an usher at my brother's wedding, and let him know that Nate wasn't transferring for tennis reasons but academic instead.

When we needed help at tennis camp, instruction and another pair of eyes to run drills, who was able but my brother himself. And where did we hold tennis camp? With who's permission? Well, my old tennis coach Tony Wright made the Angola courts available for us, while we were able to stay at my old church for lodging!

And when we needed an assistant coach for the season, I dropped back into the nets of relationships that I've formed over the years and asked Michael Steury, one of our former players, to come back and help out.

We're not even getting into the new relationships that got formed this year. Nate's transfer introduced us to his whole family, and their generosity and hospitality as his mom became the "team mom" for the year, organizing meals and all sorts of other things. And as new freshman joined as well, all new tennis families were able to jump into our widening nets.

This is one vision that I've always had for Bethany tennis, and I felt it more than ever this year. I desire us to be a family, one with wide arms embracing all the different relationships we have. From players to parents to opponents and opposing coaches, I want everyone to feel welcome and respected when they think of us. In turn, the love flows both ways, and we reaped the benefit this year in major ways.

And I like to think that we paid it forward as well, traveling over to the Regional to support the Falcons of Fairfield in their ultimately successful quest for a Regional title. Matt Ebersole was a loud cheerleader for the team that vanquished him, making friends with his opponents parents and sitting right in the front row as they clinched a Regional championship. I know that's jumping to the end of the story, but relationships were the things that set the story up in the first place.

From Tony Wright to my brother to my players to our parents, we received so much support from our "nets" this season. That was awesome, because we needed it.

Chapter One: Sweat and Hope

UPDATE: I will now be finishing the Season Narrative that I tried to write back in November. I think it's time. Chapter 2 will be out on Monday morning! Here's Chapter 1 again as a reminder.

“Really, really good.”
“Really?” she said with a surprised look on her face.
“Like, we-might-not-lose-a-regular-season-match good.”

Pouring a cup of coffee, I was asked last spring how the team would be in the fall. The answer sprung from my mouth before I could even think about it. I scrambled back to my computer to think about what I had said, pulling the 2010 schedule up before me.

The bold prediction hadn’t come out of nowhere, I mean, I had been tirelessly working on “Wednesday Opponent Overviews” for much of the winter and spring. So I knew that we would have a good shot at traditional nemeses such as Concord and Northridge. I also was aware that our top 4 players would be back for their senior seasons, and that we had varsity experience to help them in Blake Shetler.

It was more than that though. Hope was jumping out of me because of P90X. Well, at least, the fact that every night after school I had 3-4 guys staying with me to strengthen themselves for the rigors of the season. Himal, Ryan and Ike - we would crank open the creaky old windows in my classroom in the dead of February and push ourselves through Yoga X. Muscles strained, sweat dripped all over the carpet, and it stank. I could only hope the frigid wind would carry the stink away before my classes the next morning. I could only hope that the work was making us better.

It was developing our strength, that much was certain. Once, Marcelo decided that he needed to come work out with us. It was during a day of Plyometrics, jumping, squatting, turning. Sweating. Marcelo made it through half the workout before he was done, while we happily completed the rest. It felt good to know that we were working.

Hope bounds forth from hard work. Ben Mast was committing himself to lessons at the racket club, Seth Krabill had enrolled in the Elite lesson program, and even Evan Grimes taking lessons. This work, these improvements, the sweat allowed us to dream all the higher. Without the work, we could expect another good but not great 12-8 season, just like the 2009 season. With the sweat, with the conditioning, with the lessons, who was to say what the ceiling would be? 5 losses? 3 losses? 0 losses? Why not?

Dr. O. Carl Simonton once said, “In the face of uncertainty, there is nothing wrong with hope.” Every season is an uncertainty, but looking at the 2010 season, there was every reason to hope. There was the work we were putting in, and then there was the results. Ben and Seth went down to the college one night after school to hit around and happened across Jordan Kauffman and Matthew Amstutz, two recent varsity players for Bethany who played for Goshen College. In a pick-up game, Seth and Ben destroyed the two college players, 6-1. These trends of results continued, as Ben took down the all-time wins leader of Bethany, Luke Hostetter, in a summer match.

Even the new freshman were getting into the act. Joel Gerig, Parth Patel, Abe Thorne, and Justin Zehr, every night they would pile into a car and drive down to the college to find court space to play. It didn’t matter if there really wasn’t space for them all, they just wanted to play. So that sat on each other’s lap if necessary to make it happen.

With all this going on, I looked at our schedule. My thoughts were simple. We can beat Northridge, they lose five varsity players. We can beat Concord, they lose six varsity players. We can beat Goshen, Westview, and the toughest match will be Fairfield, but they will have lost four players, we can beat them too!

An undefeated team? Unlikely. But in the offseason, it is the sweat that drives the dreams. The more sweat, the more hope. And this 2010 team was letting both flow.

The Season 2009 - Chapter Five

The week of the Warsaw match, when things began to unravel, when we also lost a heartbreaker to Westview, we ended with the JV Invitational at Wawasee. It was a tournament that we got into at the last second, and honestly I didn't expect to do very well in. The only reason we got into it was because NorthWood didn't have a JV team, and the rest of the competition was bigger schools with bigger squads and more tennis tradition. I sat at the concert on Friday night, contemplating (and okay, crying) about the tattered ends of our season, unaware that on Saturday morning things would start getting woven back together.

The weather was bright, perfect temperature, and our lineup was set. Blake Shetler playing #1 singles, Matt Ebersole at #2, Ike Lehman our sacrificial lamb at #3 singles, then the seniors would play the doubles (joined by Evan Grimes). I practiced with the varsity players in the morning, a loose, relaxed, feel good practice - except for the decision that I had to make about #1 singles, but more about that later. Ben Mast and I jumped into my car then and headed down to Syracuse.

It was just a joyous morning. When we drove through Syracuse there was a street fair going on, people smiling and looking at stuff that was interesting but unbuyable. We turned onto the Wawasee High School campus and saw the brilliantly colored tents of the other teams surrounding the tennis courts, and the blue of the Bruins out on the court. When I checked in with Andrew Lanctot, we were doing well. Not just that, our underclassmen were doing well! That is a big plus for the future, I thought.

I walked around that day and watched Ike Lehman put in the most coachable and hardest working match of any player on the team all year. And he almost beat Warsaw doing it. I watched Blake beat great players and finish 2nd in the #1 singles flight. I watched Evan and Jake struggle with their serves all day long but still manage to win a match. I watched Matt Ebersole figure out how to place his well struck groundstrokes and finish 3rd. And Misha and Claude gave the best doubles team in the tournament their best match, before winning two in a row to finish 5th. All told, we finished 3rd.

We didn't win. But the day was full of memories. Blake's overhead to win the Plymouth match that he hit out, but then attacked the net again and then hit an overhead to win. Ike's match against Warsaw. The big tower to watch the matches from. The need for a line judge in the Northridge-Warsaw doubles match, and how I wandered into the bathroom so I didn't get picked. The glorious weather.

And the day was full of relationship-building. Ike listened to my coaching, and that goes a long way. The car ride with Ben was fantastic. Sitting and talking with most of the players, instead of having the pressure to coach (thanks to Andrew taking that pressure for me!) It was wonderful.

I remembered why I loved tennis, the memories and the relationships. It was the answer from God I was looking for.

Renewed and refreshed, we moved into the last two weeks of the season. My mind and my focus were back where they always should have been, but I still wanted to win. You play the games to win, it's just not what the whole season is about. And so, I decided on a new lineup, putting Seth at #1 singles, moving Blake officially into #3 singles, and off we went to the Fairfield match. And we didn't play very well, but senior night was the next day. And we played great against Bremen.

And then, another Saturday tournament, this time a varsity match in Wabash. Yet again, memories were made and relationships built. This time, we were helped out by my mistake. I thought the tournament started at 9:00, so we arrived at 8:00 to warmup and no one was there. Then I realized the tournament started at 10:00, so we drove to McDonald's to hang out for awhile. Joking around, getting free apple pies, sometimes I enjoy the things around tennis more than the tennis itself.

But the tennis was awesome that day as well. Our opponents in the match were a combined33-7. We promptly went out and won our first matchup of the day over Taylor. Then we played Wabash, and lost 2-3, but the fire that we played with, especially in the doubles, was undeniable. Austin and Kyle believed and played with emotion and took their doubles matchup to a third set breaker, which they couldn't quite pull out. But I was so proud of their work.

And then #2 doubles did the same, against Eastern, a team who finished the season with only 1 loss total, #2 doubles had to win for us to win the match. And if they won the match, we won the whole tournament on the tiebreaker system! Russell Klassen and Nick Rebec played some of their best tennis of the year, but we fell 6-7, 5-7. Oh!

But their was the whole team, lined up on the pavement, sitting and rooting for their teammates. That is what a match is about to me, loving, rooting, encouraging our brothers.
In Sectional, the next Saturday, inexperience caught up to us and though we again played with passion and belief, it wasn't enough to overcome Fairfield. We ended the season on a cold Saturday, in defeat, as the season always ends with a loss.

But this was certainly the strangest season ever for me. Through the disappointment, disillusionment, lost focus, forgetting about God and relationships, and the final loss, the thing that sticks through all of that, to me as I write 6 months later, is hope.

In James 1:2-4, James writes this to his congregation who were enduring a rough "season":

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

With proper focus, difficult seasons bring us experience. They focus us on what is really important and allow us to learn. Parts of this season were terrible, the difficult loss to Warsaw, the difficult loss of an important player from the team, the difficult loss to end the season. But the goal of life is not success, at least not the Christian life...

The goal of life is love.

Going into the season, 2009, that was not my focus. I was way off. I was concerned about my selfish goal of building a tradition that is all about me. But a season of trials, of difficulties, of conflict, decisions and full of the need for perseverance has refocused me. The season is not about me.

The season is about you.

And I do love my players. Austin Loucks and his offseason work and improvement, and then the confidence spilling over into the matches. Mikey Kelly and the time spent at tennis camp, in a custodian closet, working through life and conversation. Nick Rebec, as he learned to commit to tennis, commit to attacking tennis, play through pressure and nervousness. Misha Rebec, and the difficult position he dealt with playing some varsity as a senior but not always. Claude Stickler, and his love for tennis that let him balance school, tennis and a job in order to play. Jake Gerig, and his gregarious love for the game, love to play, with whomever whenever. I love you guys.

And I love the hope of next season, and the players that we have. This season was one of inexperience, growth, perseverance, and focusing.

Now, let's remember that it is about love.

The Season 2009 - Chapter Four

I couldn't help myself. I just sat there with one or two tears running down my cheeks, head tossed back and looking up to the sky. In the back of a dingy auditorium at Grace College, listening to the words of Denison Witmer's new song pass over me, thinking about my team...

"Carry the weight of your brother
Carry the weight of your sister
I'm not afraid to say I don't know...

I'm not afraid to say I don't know what to do...

Carry the weight of each other
Carry the weight of another
I'm not afraid to say I don't know..."

The weight of the season was simply too much for me, and I needed relief. And a singer/songwriter from Pennsylvania, playing an acoustic guitar in front of 30 college kids, and my wife and I, he hit the feeling right on the head.

The Warsaw match had happened, disastrously. Half of the JV was sick, so we got blitzed at the JV level. Their coach was upset that we didn't bring more players, because we had planned to, but literally seven people were sick. The varsity didn't fair much better, as several positions played scared, Ben got close again but couldn't pull off the big win, we had a cursing meltdown right in front of their coach. After the match I was angry, embarrassed, and nervous about how to confront the problems. If there was uncertainty beneath the surface before, spewed in front of us now.

And then, Tuesday, I got word right before practice that I needed to come talk with Jim Buller. Literally, as practice was starting, I found out that we would be without our #3 varsity player for the rest of the season, including Sectional. It was a blow to the gut, and not just in tennis terms. I love our players, I care about them as people, and I knew this would be difficult for him. I can't tell you how many nights I sat with my head in my hands, not knowing what to do, trying to figure out how to talk to the team, to my players, to my friends. I took all of that anger, embarrassment, nervousness, disappointment and buried it deep in me. I took up a fake confident attitude with the team, but I could sense the deflation in them as well. I took all these things and carried them close to my heart, hoping to do what was best for everyone.

Which is why the words of the song hit me so hard. I was carrying a heavy weight with this tennis team. And I couldn't help but feeling that some of the problems were my fault. Often, I stress relationships as being the key to a season, but this year I had tried to convince the team that on-court success was within their reach if they wanted it enough. Had I overemphasized that to the detriment of what is really important in a season, the memories and the relationships?

Probably. I wanted success so bad. Just like an early post on this site said, I have craved affirmation for years. And the best way to be affirmed is to win. Honestly, at times I looked at the 2009 season and thought that if this team succeeded I would be named coach of the year in the district! I mean, we graduated 8 seniors from a Sectional championship team, how could we repeat unless the coach was awesome? And I lost focus of what makes meaning. And I lost my focus on God.

Things that seemed to be building momentum; my church, my tennis team, my classroom teaching, all the sudden seemed to be a heavy weight on my shoulders. Not the joy they were when they began. So I cried.

Several years ago, I wrote a devotional about what happens when we cry. It contemplates Judges 2-4, where the Israelites cry out to God from their misery. They cry out 3 times between the 2 chapters. And do you know what happens each time? God answers them. God is one who will answer us when we cry out.

So I cried, and God answered.

(continued tomorrow)

The Season 2009 - Chapter Three

Racquets strings breaking every day, guys sweating through their shirts on August runs, nervous challenge matches against teammates you desperately want to beat for position's sake, quickness drills and forehand drills and service drills and on and on... this is the grind of the season's beginning. Different teams take to this part of the season in different ways, but I could tell that our 2009 squad was a bit tentative in its immersion into full preparation.

In the drills, the team searched for a solid leader, someone whose example could be followed, whose effort could be emulated. In the intra-squad matches, we struggled to play with intensity and effort for a whole set. In team situations, we looked for a vocal leader to challenge and encourage us. These things seemed to be in flux and in formation. We weren't sure who the leaders were, who our best player was, how good our team could be, or even how hard we were supposed to work.

As a coach, I'm sure I didn't make this any easier. Uncertainty ruled my mind as well, who would play #1? Mikey beat Seth, Ben beat Mikey, but then Seth beat Ben! And then doubles, Austin and Kyle at #1 doubles? But Kyle and Russell were undefeated together at JV last year... what if we put one of them at #2 doubles to make that position stronger? Should Mikey play doubles like he did in 2008, going 20-2, or is he ready to transition to a strong singles spot?

As these questions washed over me, our first match arrived. Northridge, up in Middlebury, the defending Regional champions. I was confident that we could put up a fight, and was hoping to see some of my lineup questions answered. We played really well, with Seth winning #2 singles, Ben challenging one of the best in the area at #1 singles, and taking leads before falling at both doubles positions. Perhaps, we had found the lineup? It was hard to tell, because Mikey had unfortunately cramped during his #3 singles matchup, and so I couldn't tell if he was going to be able to play singles as effectively as doubles or not.

So we changed the lineup and beat Goshen. Then we kept that same lineup and got smoked by Concord. Then we changed again and smoked Mishawaka. Changed again and beat Fremont. Starting with the Fremont match, we really settled on a lineup, and that certainty (along with the caliber of opponents) really got us on a role. In fact, after losing to Concord, we reeled off nine wins in a row!

During this time there were unforgettable memories. The Triton match will be one of my favorite matches forever. I spent a lot of time before the match preparing Ben Mast for his #1 singles match with Ben Montalbano. I was sure that if we won that spot, we'd win the match. But, though Ben executed brilliantly, Montalbano played some of the most incredible points I've ever seen coaching tennis. He ran down overheads, hit perfect lobs again and again, boomed some big serves, and showcased top-notch athleticism. I loved this match though, because it was one in which my coaching helped give Ben a chance.

But instead, the match came down to #1 doubles. The team sat on the grass behind the court, eating glazed donuts and watching "Our Heroes" go into a third set tiebreak. These are the best times, everybody in one place hoping for one thing. Austin and Kyle were probably the best at realizing that when the pressure is on, you have to be aggressive, and they were in closing out the tiebreak. Then we were onto the court to congratulate them! These matches are the ones that we should remember after the season is over...

These were good times with high expectations. I mean, we beat eventual Sectional champion Jimtown, without Mikey. We were beginning to think not only about a Sectional championship, but possibly making the 70% winning percentage plaque in the hallway, making the All-District teams, challenging the 2008 or 1999 teams as the best Bruins teams ever.

Admittedly, we were playing really well through this stretch of the season, but there was something still underneath. Like what rumbled through team camp in the summer, there was still a sense of something not quite clicking, that we weren't quite 100%. It started to come out here and there, in many different people. Some people worried too much about their own position and didn't revel in team wins, some people were overly critical of their own game, some people didn't push themselves hard enough, some people couldn't come to grips with the position they were playing. We found ourselves worrying far more than enjoying our play and our teammates.

As in the offseason, the only thing you can truly control is your effort. Teams that put in full effort, and then enjoy their teammates and their matches are the teams that are successful. You do the work in practice, and then play the matches. At times, I questioned whether we were putting in the full effort, and then whether we were enjoying our teammates and our matches. Ultimately, that's what makes an experience great.

But at 10-2, with a nine match winning streak, we were in great position. It seemed like a good time to challenge ourselves, to step up and take on the best competition, to really see what it meant to play at the level of Sectional champion or Regional competitor. With that, we got ready to hit the midway point of our season, and in early September we took on traditional tennis power Warsaw...

The Season 2009 - Chapter Two

The summer of 2009 seemed slow in coming, but rich in possibility. After the disorientation that always seems to happen in May, summer is a grasping at straws in the wind and trying to tie them together, make them grow flowers, and become a beautiful bouquet.

Summer has it's brilliant summer sun, warm temperatures, trips to the beaches and vacation relaxation. Summer mornings went this way for me... Kyle, Seth, Matt and I hitting at the courts almost every crisp June morning, heading instead to the dark gym to hear Tony Horton call out what push-ups we were to do, watching Gideon run around the courts setting up cones or yelling out hello to the passing trains... those are good times.

And I appreciate the characteristics of people that I got to know. Seth is amazing with kids, and loved to hit and goof around with Gideon. Kyle can boom his serves. My little 1 year old son loves tennis. Ab Ribber X is by far the hardest of the P90X workouts. Little things.

We played in a summer league too. That holds some amazing memories as well. Traveling up to Buchanan and Berrien Springs to play two matches on a day that was blistering hot (near 100 degrees!) But really, watching the progression of our team within that one day, watching us "get it," that was amazing. From the first match to the second match, Austin, Kyle, and Blake all showed remarkable improvement. And we defeated Berrien Springs 4-1, which would have been 5-0 if Claude hadn't have gotten sick from his Subway. I remember laying in the sparse shade of a couple really old and dying trees that day and thinking, "I think I've found my team, the spirit that we need."

There were other great summer league matches as well. Mikey against Lakeshore was amazing. Mikey ran down everything, hit everything back and competed with a focused intensity, even saving one match point that looked like the end for sure. After that match, the coach commented that Mikey had to be one of the most athletic players he had ever seen. The team was looking good.

And I need to remember those sunny moments and fond memories, because sometimes storm clouds can simply overwhelm the whole landscape. Last summer had it's share of rain, both literal and figurative.

There was team camp. A scheduling mistake meant that we were at the Angola courts the week that they were hosting a round-robin tournament, and using the courts all the time. This banished us to a local elementary school, and where there were only four courts, one with a tattered net. Then, on Tuesday the rains came down, and for the next three days we dodged storm after storm, trying to find dry courts and other things to fill our time. We did P90X as a team, we played games in the gym, we slept.

But there was more than that even. There were the uncommitted people among our team members, people who didn't want to work hard. It was unbelievably frustrating to get the team working on a drill and see two or three people messing around. Or to be doing a P90X workout and see some people just sitting out. That's not Bethany Christian tennis and hard work, that was just laziness!

And then there was conflict. Conflict with the church as we left too much of a mess from climbing into the ceiling during hide-and-go-seek. Conflict between players as we spent too much time together and hit on some raw nerves. The inevitable "Speed Ball Conflict" of arguing over the rules. For me, though team camp still had it's fun moments and memories (Pizza King, new nicknames for the freshman "Sam & Damien", fried chicken), it was still the most stressful camp I've led.

And of course, it was more than team camp. There were the uncertainties. We were really only getting 5 varsity hopefuls to the open courts and summer matches. What was going to happen to the other two? Seth left in the month of July to go to Oregon, would that set back his game? We had several smashed racquets and anger outbursts, would those continue. And what does a coach who doesn't like conflict do with a summer full of it?

It was a disorienting summer that I wasn't sure had a full sense of purpose. There was sun and there was rain, but were the clouds clearing for a beautiful sunset or were they gathering for an awful Indiana storm? But then, you're never really sure at the summer stage, it is just hints about what is to come. Were we correcting our weaknesses, focusing on goals, and getting better or just out playing tennis? Were we dealing with problems, getting them out there and getting them fixed, or were we ignoring them?

Were we mending tattered nets or just playing over them?

The Season 2009 - Chapter One

Do you write a story when you know you won't like the ending? How do you tell the truth about real life, with all its ups and downs, accomplishments and disappointments, and end it utterly filled with joy?

It's now the spring, and the 2009 tennis season is months past. It seems like it is time to start telling its story. A fresh new crop of varsity players, a brand new "beginner" class of freshmen, unbelievable improvement and achievement, and in the end... well, let's save that for the end.

I want to tell stories, stories that begin in the weight room and end in Maple City Racquet Club on a Saturday morning in October. Stories that involve freshman with squeaky voices, sophomores with determination, juniors and P90X, seniors and their "C'mon's!" and fist pumps. Stories that ring true to the experience of the players, coaches and fans. But most of all, I want to tell stories that make meaning.

After the 2008 season, after the Sectional championship, I found myself unsatisfied. Success was relieving, but I found myself more obsessed with doing it again. Instead of celebrating, I found myself scheming, planning and worrying. Which was okay, my returning team felt the same way. Despite their important role in helping challenge and motivate the 2008 varsity, the returning players didn't feel like the Sectional championship was their own.

And so I began to offer programs for everything and designed for everyone. Ben Mast, Seth Krabill, Blake Shetler and I began to spend cold mornings together in the dreary middle school gym. Flip the volleyball posts upside down, string the net across the middle and put some cones out to serve as the service box, and you've got yourself a tennis court. Kind of a tennis court, you still had to imagine most of the lines. We hit serves, our racquets dodging the bottom of the basketball backboards. We hit groundstrokes, the balls skidding off the shiny and freshly laminated floorboards. Others would join us every now and then. Kyle Miller made some appearances, new freshman Ike Lehman, and every once in a rare while, Matt Ebersole. It was always good to see these guys in the morning, knowing that being here so early showed the same dedication to excellence that I wanted to have.

There were, I'm sure, many interesting early morning conversations at these sessions. But, unfortunately, I don't remember many of these, probably because it was in the early morning. I do remember one time that I brought a camera and took stop action photos of Seth and Ben's forehands. I fully intended to analyze these photos, but when I pulled them up on the computer, I realized that there was very little that I could correct in their swings. Not because their swings are perfect, but because I didn't know what I was looking for. So it was early in the offseason that I had to face up with my shortcomings as a tennis coach. I didn't know enough to help my players.

That was disturbing and depressing to me. But it didn't stop the team's drive. We also were busy lifting weights and gaining strength. Kyle Miller and Austin Loucks often participated in strength and quickness training after school. We'd hit the weight room, and then do footwork drills down the middle school locker room hallway. 8th grade basketball players would try to slide by our sweaty bodies without being pushed into the cement walls. In the weight room, we did some lifting, but the conversations were interesting, if inconsequential. I remember Austin talking about his first dates with a certain girlfriend, Kyle constantly wondering how to make his core stronger, and Russell and Kyle asking me very detailed personal questions after my wife and I presented a chapel on "Sexuality."

Despite the strange things I remember, I like these times of the season. But they also stress me out. They tell me who is willing to work hard, and usually a team can only win big if they have talent and work ethic. This team, the 2009 Bruin team, had some talent. Despite inexperience, the JV players moving up to varsity had compiled a 16-0 JV Record, only losing 5 individual spots. But would we work hard? Would we stay committed? I remember showing up several times for morning sessions in the gym and no one was there. I went and showered in the coaches office, thinking if we really had enough dedication to win? And even with those who were coming to work (Ben, Seth, Kyle, Austin, Matt, Blake, Ike), among them were only 4 people who figured to be varsity. Who would be the other 3? Would they be working?

Some of these worries would haunt me through the season, some were resolved. In the midst of another offseason as I write this, I know that I have all the same worries. But what remains with me from last offseason? The good memories. But what was important to our success? The amount and quality of work put in. Memories last and make meaning, quality of work leads to success on the court. A good tennis offseason will balance the two in large quantities.

The Season: Part Ten

What do we measure success by? How, as Christians, do we look at a tennis season, or anything else for that matter, and say that God has blessed us? When I get to the end of a season, what will make me proud as I look back?

It can't be wins and losses. If it's wins and losses then there is a lot that I am not proud of throughout my history as a coach. If it's only wins and losses, then I am still fuming over the East Noble regional loss, the Concord loss, the Westview loss, even the Northridge loss. But I'm not.

The thing with wins and losses is that they are quantifiable. They are a safe and standard measure. That's why churches compare themselves to one another by looking at how many people are attending. Isn't the important thing about a church the way that they are responding to the teaching and following God? So what do numbers have to do with that. It's the same with wins and losses. They are measures of our talent, okay, I can agree with that. But is talent the same as success. I answer with a certain no.

So what measures success? I find that I look at success in two ways, and they have to do with reasons that I coach. The first measure is memories, the second is relationships.

I'm a story teller, come into any of my classes and you'll hear me telling stories of friends, family, and my life. I value new stories and new experiences. Tennis provides those for me. But the memories, the stories also provide opportunities to think about the nature of reality, the nature of life. And I find that since God is the ultimate creator of all reality, all the stories point to God. They all speak in some way of the nature of God or the world that God created.

This season answered the memories measure like none before. And some of these stories are inspiring and amazing.

The Penn match we rolled into with a record of 13-4. We had lost some heartbreakingly close matches to Westview and Concord the week before. Pulling into the school parking lot was an experience in itself. It had the feel of a small college campus, not the quaint old high school building we were used to. On the field next to the tennis courts, we walked by the Ultimate Frisbee club team practicing on one of the many practice fields available to the Penn mass of students. One of the them called to us that their team was awesome and we had no chance of winning. "They're going to destroy you," he said. I have to admit, with the massive nature of the school, the Penn team, their tradition, I thought that he was going to be right. Plus, I thought maybe God was going to smite me for my earlier pride in declaring that we would beat Penn this year.

But we warmed up and did our normal routine. The Penn players swarmed around in what seemed like disarray to me and I decided to use the atmosphere of distraction as a reason to focus all of our players. I remember exactly what I said as I gathered them together. "Penn is an excellent team. But each one of you has played against a better player at your position this year. There is nothing to be afraid of." Then the craziest thing happened: Everybody believed me. We went out playing like there was nothing to lose. I was so excited as I watched our doubles teams demolish their opponents in the first set, and so proud to watch their excitement as the pumped their fists, let out screams of encouragement and accomplishment. I watched as Luke gave perhaps the best player he played all year as much as he could handle. Watched as Jonny outstroked a similar opponent. Watched as the JV players pulled off many close wins to seal their undefeated season. When the match ended, I was glowing. I wanted to share the joy with everyone.

But what we soon learn with these memories is this: The only people who care are those who have the relational bond of the tennis team. My wife was somewhat happy, the athletic director Bryan was impressed, my friends at church smiled, but no one felt the deep joy that I had like the rest of the team. And that is why the relationships I have with all of the team is so important. I have a place to share my life, especially my tennis life, because I have a group of brothers who is experiencing the same thing.

And the experiences grew. One week and one day after the Penn victory we stood on the cold courts of Goshen High School seeking the first Sectional crown in Bethany history. It was so cold we could see our breath. The whole season had been nice weather and as we warmed up for our biggest match of the season, our sweat began to steam off our bodies. I told the guys that this was the setting that memories were made out of. Then we went out and played the worst tennis we've played all season. We were so tentative, we played like we hoped we didn't lose instead of wanting to win.

In that match, it became obvious to me that the whole season was coming down to one single position, two doubles. And when they went down 1-5 in the third set, I almost began to cry. It seemed so unfair to me that someone would work as hard as Daniel, care as much as Mikey, only to see the dream crumble in their hands. I really hope that they weren't thinking about this big picture while they competed, but I certainly was. And so I started praying. And I started waving. We'd been talking about prayer all year long, and blessings, and so I combined the two. "Lord, bless these two guys. They've worked so hard, they've put in so much time. The blessing would be to let them play that way, to eat the fruits of their labor." Again and again I paced behind Daniel and Mikey's court praying and waving my hands toward them, "Lord, bless. Lord, bless." Then with more urgency, "C'mon, Lord, bless these guys." And they started to come back, and they kept coming back, and then they entered a tiebreaker to decide the team match.

A little bit of back history, Mikey and Daniel had never won any tiebreakers. They always lost in matches, except in the previous week they had defeated Assistant Coach Andrew Lanctot and Russell Klassen in a tiebreaker at the end of the first set. Daniel had said then, "I guess we can win tiebreakers." As we stood and watched the fate of the Sectional, I thought back to that first tiebreak win and hoped that they would draw confidence from it, and win their first tiebreak ever in a real match.

Of course, if you read the banner at the top of the website, they did win the match. My favorite memory from the tiebreak is them being up 6-2 and Mikey double-faulting trying to pound in an ace for the victory. I like it because it was so aggressive. Man alive, the blessings flowed then.

But it wasn't the end of the story. I almost wish it was, because it was the climax. Oh, we played awesome in the afternoon and took it to NorthWood, lifted the Sectional trophy and went to El Camino to celebrate. But it was anti-climatic. And then the season ended on Tuesday, in another tiebreak.

I don't want to get into all the specifics because we are losing space for this post. But Daniel and Mikey were twice put into a tiebreak to win our first round Regional match for the team, and twice they failed. Jonny Shenk had a chance at a third set for the same prize, but came up short. But that memory to me is just as sweet as any other, and maybe tells of the success of this team more than any other.

After the match, there were no words. There were tears and there was a gathering of the team on the court. And they looked to me, and I said something about being proud. Because I was. We stood together and didn't say anything. We couldn't look at each other because we knew what was happening. This was the end of the season. We would never share the same experiences again. Looking into the face of each senior, it felt like we were all breaking up. That tearing in your stomach, that sense of longing for the way things used to be, that desperation to go back and do something over again.

This recap of the season has been my way of trying to relive it again. Trying to learn from the memories again. Trying to hold onto the relationships that I've formed, that are bound to go different ways as the seniors go to college and I stay here and joyously get to coach the underclassmen again. And build into those relationships more and more. But I treasure the times in the hall where any one of the team stops and talks to me. I treasure the letters I get to write to the colleges the seniors want to attend. I treasure hearing about Jared's bowling team experience, or Mikey's last second tip-in in the basketball game, or Seth's continued tennis lessons, or Austin's weight loss accomplishments, or Matthew's articles in the Reflector, or Johnny's college plans, or whatever and whatever, etc.

I care. The season was a success because I care and I can tell you why. "The Season" gave me memories I can always share with you, my brothers and friends.

The Season: Part Nine

It's a common expression to say that "God works in mysterious ways." I've seen it be true however, in many different areas of life. One of my best friends was looking for a job last Christmas season, trying to decide if he would follow his dreams of graphic design or just go serve coffees and lattes at Starbucks. After a month with no leads, he went to seek the advice of a friend in the graphic design business. As things turned out, the advice turned into a job offer with one of the top firms in Elkhart county. Thing was, that job wasn't available two weeks earlier. If he had gone in for the advice two weeks earlier, when he was starting to feel desperate, he wouldn't have had the same opportunity. The waiting had seemed like a curse, turned out that it was a blessing.

For the BC tennis team, we left the NorthWood match in a celebratory mood, but had a big tournament coming up the very next day. In the tournament were teams that I was very interested in matching up against with. Indianapolis Park Tudor was at the tourney, ranked #6 in the state at the time. Fort Wayne Canterbury was at the tourney, ranked #17 in the state at the time. Perennial area power Warsaw hosted the tournament, and there were several other strong players and teams coming. I'm still very interested in how we would have done against those teams. That is to say that we never got to play any of them.

We played NorthWood on a Friday night, Saturday morning I woke up to rain. All the night and all the morning it rained, rained, rained. I had my cell phone on in case the Warsaw coach called and wanted my opinion. I had determined that my opinion would be that we should try to play no matter what. I got up and showered, put on my silly hat and got ready to drive to the school. Then the Warsaw coach called. Unfortunately he didn't ask my advice, just told me that it was cancelled.

It was depressing. I had really been hoping to use this measuring stick, hoping that we would be able to prove our team's ability to the whole region by performing well in this fairly prestigious tournament. My wife tried to cheer me up by saying that I would have a whole weekend with my family, and I just couldn't think of it that way. Well, okay, by the end of the weekend with my little son I was happy to have spent that time with him, but originally I didn't see this as a family opportunity at all. I just saw the rain as curses falling from the sky, drop by drop.

When I went to school on Monday I stepped into our Athletic Directors office to begin the process of trying to fill our schedule again now that this tournament had fallen by the wayside. I told him that I'd keep my eye open for any tourneys looking for new teams, and that if I couldn't find any that we could maybe schedule a couple dual matches instead. That's where the curses turned into God's odd blessings.

I found on the Coaches Association website that Penn was looking for some home matches at the end of September to open their new courts. So I went back to tell Bryan that I would like to play them. When I walked into his office, he told me that the Concord coach had contacted him about a new tournament, involving Westview, Lakeland, Bethany and Concord. I was excited about that tournament, but I still wanted to play Penn. I told Bryan, and he looked at me with a puzzled look on his face, and repeated, "You want to play Penn?" I had been following Penn throughout the year, looking at their scores in the paper, and I made a foolish statement. Well, it wasn't completely foolish, but it was a little bit more assured than what I felt. I thought that we could beat Penn, but what I told Bryan was, "We'd beat them this year."

Spurred by the assurity of my statement, Bryan called Penn. Sure enough, they would be glad to play us. So the Warsaw tournament was replaced by the Concord tournament, and we also added Penn into an open slot in our schedule. Our loss had been replaced. The rain had become a blessing.

Funny thing is, that if you look at the season's prayer wall, Daniel prayed exactly for that. That somehow the rain would become a blessing to us. It proved to me again and again that God answers prayers in ways that we wouldn't request. But my eyes were beginning to recognize the way that situations were being turned for the good.

So now it was up to us to take advantage of our opportunities. You can read the match reports by clicking on the sidebar. But obviously if you look at it, we lost 2 matches and won 2 matches out of the 4 rescheduled games. So it maybe wasn't the best for our overall record. In fact, if we had played our previous schedule, we would have finished the regular season with only two losses, because we wouldn't have picked up the Concord tournament and lost to Concord again and Westview. But I'll tell you what, this rescheduling was certainly a success. And that's because of what I measure success by. But that's the story of the next post.

The Season: Part Eight

Defining moments are so much easier to see when they are in the rear-view mirror. When you are living these moments, they are difficult to recognize because you are engrossed in the task at hand, the tiny goal that is being accomplished. Sometimes we are even quick to want to rush on to the next thing, not even realizing the importance of the time at hand.

I can't count how many of those moments pass in a school year. Every day I say things, make arguments, give assignments, present theories, pray prayers, do activities, etc. Only later do I find out which one of those made an impact. Rarely do I know when the thing that I am saying is going to change the course of a school year, season, or class for a student or player.

Except this season, I knew that the NorthWood regular season match was going to be a transitional moment for our team. I knew that the result would impact the way we looked at the rest of the season. The funny thing was, I didn't know how I wanted it to go. I actually thought going into the match that it might be a good thing for us to lose. I wondered if a loss to our Sectional rivals might light a fire under us, get us pumped for revenge in Sectional, and take the target off our backs. I am glad that I was wrong.

As far as defining moments go, usually when you think that you are headed into a big match, it fails to live up to its billing. Just Saturday, I invited some friends over to watch the big college football game between #2 Texas Tech and #5 Oklahoma. It seemed like a "defining moment" game to me, two of the best teams in the country it what would be an epic clash for the conference title. Far from epic, Oklahoma destroyed the Red Raiders, 65-21. The game wasn't even fun to watch. My friends left right after halftime. It did not live up to the billing.

Our NorthWood match did. I knew it would be a "battle" as assistant Andrew says, and it sure was. We won two positions rather easily (thanks to our dominating number two doubles team and steady winning senior Jonny Shenk), but the rest of the matches drug on into the early evening beneath the mammoth football bleachers behind the courts. Number one doubles clinched the first set, a big momentum builder for them, but we dropped first sets at both number one and two singles.

I think everyone there started to feel like it was going to come down to whichever match was on the courts last. It was destined to be that match that is tied 2-2 and the last position either wins it or loses it. I love that feeling at a tennis match. People all move their chairs behind the courts that are still playing. The players shout louder when they win points. Parents cheer louder when an overhead is smashed over the fence. Parents and teammates whisper more about close line calls. Coaches pace back and forth and try to offer encouragement and guidance while containing their own nerves so that the players don't know they are freaking out too. In this case, the coach is so nervous that he keeps taking off his hat and giving it to Kyle Miller, then coming and taking it back, then wringing it in his hand, then giving back to Kyle, etc. I knew there was a practical use for the hat wearing, an object to work out my shaky nerves on.

You can read the full match report here, but it was an epic finish. The number one thing that I learned this season as far as tennis coaching goes was illustrated beautifully in this match. When it comes to pressure time, the team that can confidently attack will win the match. The guy who plays not to lose, will lose. When it finally came down to that last player on the court, winner take all for his team, Jared Schwartzentruber stood out on the courts representing his Bruins.

It's kind of a David vs. Goliath story in a way. Not that NorthWood is this super huge school and we are the puny underdogs, because we were just as talented and deserving as any team this year. More in the sense of you send out your man and we'll send out ours, whoever wins the one on one battle, there team wins the war. And in that tension, the best advice is to step forward and confidently throw your stones. Play to your strengths and attack.

When Jared crossed over to the other side of the net with a 6-5 lead in the third set, I only had brief advice for him. "Stay aggressive. Big serves now." I don't remember if those were my exact words, but man... Jared delivered. He attacked. He played an aggressive game with two big first serves to build his lead, and then he swung his aggressive, attacking groundstrokes wide to the backhand then wide to the forehand and went for the win. The aggressive one who puts out their the best effort to win, they will win.

There were all sorts of other intangibles that came together for this match too, beyond the play. We had just talked at practice about praying for our "enemies" and realizing that these were the teams that we played, we had taken time to pray for the NorthWood players. So at the end of the match, instead of a "Ha, we win, you lose!" attitude, I felt more deeply for the players that had lost the match. There was a deep admiration for them that I felt. They had fought and worked as hard as we in the match, and not won. I knew how that felt. So for myself, there was team pride, but it was kept in perspective.

But the key thing about the win is that it started to cement our identity as tennis players. We had beaten a good team, and it felt like we deserved to win as well. It wasn't a fluke. I think this was a moment where we truly started to see our goal coming into focus. If we could beat this team again, we would probably be Sectional champions. And we had the confidence of beating them this once.

The Season: Part Seven

From our place of injury and lack of confidence, the season started. Our first match was a home match against Northridge. I thought that this was a critical match for us on the season, really showing us how we would do throughout the season. We had lost to Northridge 3-2 the year before, and this year we had everyone coming back so...

But of course, we weren't at full strength. We were missing Mikey and Johnny, and I was pretty sure Luke wasn't confident in taking on Jeff George, Northridge's #1, a player that he had beaten in an epic match the year before.

Looking back on the season from November, I realize now that I made a mistake. I wanted to set up our lineup so that we would have a chance to win. So I took Jared and put him in the number one doubles spot. Just as an aside, Jared had never played doubles in his entire career at Bethany. I don't even think he had played doubles on JV his freshman year. I moved Ben Mast up from the JV to play three singles, because Jonny Shenk was playing number two singles. And Seth Krabill filled in for Mikey at number two doubles.

Number two doubles ended up being no problem, but my other "brilliant" changes didn't work out so well. Jared had trouble adjusting to doubles, and so he and Jeremy Thomas lost the first set 1-6. Jared and Jeremy got it together for the second set, but still lost 4-6. Jared then went on to win 19 of his 21 singles matches on the season. So, yea, probably would have been better served leaving the lineup alone and just substituting for our injured players.

It an indication of my lack of confidence and desperation at the beginning of the season as well. I felt like I had to do something tricky and different with our lineup in order for us to defeat a team like Northridge. I felt like we would lose if we just simply lined up in our normal fashion and played them. Now I am ashamed to think about that. Jared could have played against Northridge's number two and won. Jonny could have won at number three and we still should have been able to pull off two doubles. But I was afraid, we changed what we did, and it didn't work.

Our JV used this match as a precursor to their season as well. With two of their better players representing the varsity (Ben Mast and Seth Krabill), they still pulled off a 4-3 victory (and that included a loss by a left-handed Mikey Kelly). This was the first of several statements of certainty that the JV made about their team. What I mean by that is that the JV knew, even after this first match, that they were good and that they could play with anyone. They were certain of who they were, what their ability was and what they could accomplish.

They continued these statements in the early part of the season. They crushed Goshen in their next match, went an amazing 17-0 as a team at the Jimtown Invitational. At that Jimtown Invite we took on teams like Jimtown and Concord, teams we typically don't beat, and the JV was not only winning, but winning easily. It simply reinforced the image they had of themselves.

For the varsity, it was lack of certainty that plagued the team early in the season. With the injuries, we were unsure of what we could be after the Northridge match. We had a couple of easy matches, then played Concord. There was uncertainty throughout the lineup in that match. Jared Schwartzentruber played absolutely incredible tennis, making a statement about his confidence for the season. Luke, Daniel and Mikey, and Johnny and Jeremy all started out shaky and a bit unsure. It was something that we would have to work through the rest of the month of August. We lost first sets in 4 of the 5 matches to Concord, but then recovered and won second sets in 2 of them. But for Luke and number two doubles, the uncertainty showed up again in the third set tiebreakers.

Whenever the team was uncertain, we would become tentative. That's the nature of tennis, you get it in your mind that you don't want to lose instead of that you want to win. Now, at the time I didn't know Luke was dealing with injury too, but both positions looked tentative in the tiebreakers. We lost them both. We weren't convinced yet of how good we were.

We skated through the rest of the month of August relatively unchallenged. Many of the teams we played have given us great battles in the past (Fremont, Triton), but this season we were just too strong. Still, these teams weren't state ranked quality teams, ones that we had thought at the beginning of the season that we could play with. So we were winning but still unsure of our abilities, or at least that's how I read most of the players to feel.

But that changed at the beginning of September, with one comment from a coach and one well-played team match. But that's for part eight...

The Season: Part Six

So the summer ends and the season arrives. It was about time for the season to begin. The offseason is the part of the year where we do all of our work, the season is supposed to be the blessing of that work.

I mean, we still continued to work hard. In the first conditioning week of the season we did about 40 minutes of footwork drills to start each session and then ran anywhere between 2 to 5 miles each night. In fact, one evening I gave the team the choice of how far to run, but they had to do at least 2.5 miles. Nobody did the least, most people ran 3.5 - 4.5 miles, and Luke led the team by running almost 8 miles that day. So we were working hard, and we were certainly continuing our dedication.

But the payoffs were so much closer. And the closer they got, the more bad news we started receiving. First of all, Mikey Kelly, number two doubles power server extraordinaire, broke his right hand playing baseball during the month of July. The injury put him out for several months, including our first match of the season against Northridge. Well, Mikey played in the match, left-handed, on the JV level. But obviously, moving into our first match we would not be at full strength without Mikey.

Secondly, we were struggling with confidence issues. Number three singles player Jonny Shenk found himself in a battle for his position. Both Ben Mast and Seth Krabill started the practice season playing great, and Jonny dropped tiebreaks and sets to each of them. Again, this spoke to the deep talent pool that our team had, but it unsettled Jonny. Coming off a 16-6 season, the most wins by any player in a single season that I'd ever coached, Jonny expected to be competing for an undefeated or at least highly successful varsity season. At this juncture he worried about being a JV player instead. And the confidence problems didn't stop with him. Luke Hostetter was also feeling the pressure of improving on his outstanding 2007 season. He had tied with Jonny for best record on the team, and played some incredible matches under pressure. But coming into the season, he seemed to doubt his ability to get it done in the clutch again. And there really was no seeable reason for that doubt.

These worried me. Tennis is such a mental game that belief often dictates results. I really was afraid that two of our singles players self doubts could crumble the team season, or the team unity, or the team belief. I was also worried about put people in the proper positions, rewarding the seniors for their hard work but not overlooking the talent of the underclassmen.

But what was a real blow to my confidence happened three days into the season training. Our captain, Johnny Kauffman told me he was having pain in his hip and needed to sit out. Now Johnny is the outspoken leader of the team, pushing teammates to work their hardest. When he told me he was hurt, I knew something was seriously wrong. It troubled me all that day, then what I found out seemed even more serious than what I had thought. Johnny had a pinched nerve.

Immediately I panicked. It seemed like the type of injury that could keep him out all season. Being honest, I got really mad at God. It seemed that God wasn't rewarding our players for their long work that they had invested in this tennis season. Jonny and Luke were doubting themselves, Mikey was injured, and Johnny was in doubt for much of the season in my mind. Sometimes at the end of a successful road, we forget much of the struggle. But I remember this point well. And sometimes when telling success stories we want to jump to the "but then!"

But for a good two weeks, I was in this position of doubt. Constantly I was thinking of lineups that would cover the weakness of having lost Johnny and Mikey for some time. I tried to arrange challenge matches that would revive the confidence of Luke and Jonny. I worried that other players would feel the burden and not be ready to step up and win matches because of our missing players. I fretted over the sophomores, Ben Mast and Seth Krabill, that might be inserted into the varsity lineup, that they wouldn't be experienced enough to win the tough matches, two of which would be played in the first week. I thought the Angola scrimmage might help calm some of the nerves, but it was so weird and distracting that I left that night feeling that it hurt us more than helped us.

So there we were, ready for our first match and I didn't really feel ready. Competitive but were we going to have enough to meet our goals. It seemed like we had had enough unfortunate incidents to last the season, and in this bad situation, I clung to hope that there would be blessings as well.

The Season: Summer Camp Edition

Since my appointment as coach, I have instituted several changes throughout the Bethany Christian tennis program. I made sure that we looked the part as competitors by changing our uniforms from t-shirts to true tennis gear. We began a tradition of video scavenger hunts during the last week of the season. We've come together to celebrate the start of season with midnight practices, complete with the process of praying the lines. We've actually started getting together for conditioning week, something unheard of before my time. There are probably more things as well. But the one new part of tennis season that I am most proud of is the summer camp.

Summer camp is probably the most fun that we have all season, packed into one long, tired, and community filled week. We all pile into an old school van, load up some semi-willing senior's car with our extra gear, from tennis bags to sleeping bags. We play tennis 4-6 hours a day, come back to the church where we crash and play video games, speedball, dodgeball, cards, sleep...whatever our bodies can handle.

What's amazing is that within the tradition of summer camp, new traditions have formed. We always play hide-and-go-seek, and in the enormous church building that we call home for the week, some ingenious and unfindable hiding spots have been used. We always do devotionals in the evenings, either written out or spoken in the youth room. We always go to Pizza King for one of the evening meals. And usually hit the Great Wall of China Buffet at least once during the week for lunch, and regret it later. Recently, speedball has become a loved and heated tradition.

I'm hard pressed to find anyone who regrets spending time together at team camp. This year was no exception. You can find my top ten camp memories here, but let me just tell you my perspective on the week.

After all the good things that I've just said about camp, I entered this week not looking forward to it at all. It was the first tennis camp since we have had children, and I was leaving my wife all alone with Gideon. Not exactly the best way to win brownie points. We had also spent the entire weekend before camp started, from Thursday night through Sunday night, in Kokomo for my brother's wedding, where I had had the responsibilities of the best man. From Monday to Thursday I had been running my elementary and middle school camp with Sarah Yoder and running the first of our Michigan matches. I was exhausted before the exhausting week ever started.

But it is a good tradition, and I can't let the guys down. It actually went through my mind to just have the camp at Bethany, with no overnight. Then I realized that would kill the whole purpose of the camp. So, I made phone calls on the drive home from Kokomo to make sure I knew who all was coming and then had the van fired up and ready to go come 8:00 Monday morning.

When it came to this year's camp, I have very few memories of the actual tennis played throughout the course of the week. I remember Austin and Daniel dominating a doubles game that they got paired in. I remember that we played Team 105 and Kyle Miller was the first to be picked, above any varsity player. I think his team actually won too. I remember the drawing that we found on the number one singles court. I remember running through the woods calling out how much time was left. But the biggest impression I had about the team is that they took their tennis seriously.

When we hit the courts we were ready to practice, with one exception. And this was a team expectation, not a coach expectation. When someone wasn't ready to try hard, to practice correctly, and just wanted to goof around...well, the rest of the guys weren't happy about that. And they often would let them know. Even guys who I might have labeled as slackers in the past, they were encouraging each other to work hard throughout the week.

I have to highlight that. Most of the times, people come to camp just looking to have a good time. This team realized that we were going to have a good time, so their purpose to be at camp was to get a tennis workout. And I hope that happened.

But of course we had a good time. At Pizza King I discovered that several of the seniors guys had an affinity for barbeque sauce on their pizza just like me. During speedball we found that we need to have a very strictly defined rulebook and an appointed, impartial referee in order to keep the game from descending into argued and violent conflict. Jared and Luke were basically unfindable as they hid on a roof beneath the outer roof. We dressed up as Roman soldiers and marched through the church with spears out, looking for Russell hiding in the tiniest places (stuffed into the dishwasher this year). We took showers one at a time, seeing who could undress, shower, dry, and redress in the shortest amount of time. I think Daniel might have won that contest, in under a minute and a half.

And we laid out the verbs for the season: Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray. Okay, so I stole the whole verb followed by a period idea from modern advertising (Goshen Health Systems: True. Care. Well, okay, I guess those aren't both verbs, but, whatever...) I had gotten up at 5:00 to type out the devotionals for all the players to read, but the printers at school were all offline and the network was down and I didn't have time to run home and print them all out. So in a last second change I talked about these foundational values every night to the team. I wasn't sure that they were completely convinced. A lot of that changed when we got to the season though.

I got to see my son throughout the camp as well, as Courtney came over twice to my parents house and to her parents house as they hosted the team, each on a different night. It ended up being a wonderful week. Okay, so I was still tired all the time. But it is week's like this that make the team more than players to me. It is times of community like this that make me see the team as my brothers.

The Season: Part Five

"Summertime, summertime, windows down and watch the world go by..." - Mae

Anymore, the summer break from school just buzzes by me. From getting together with family, to vacations, to working to win Sectional titles, there isn't that much time to rest. Summer is also the time of reality, when the hope and work of the off-season starts to come to either fruition or frustration.

We actually started something new this summer too, we competed in a summer league against schools from Michigan. It was very interesting to see how we matched up against competition from across the border, and it began to show me a characteristic of our team that ended up defining much of our season. That characteristic was our depth.

During the Michigan season we played 6 matches and won them all. To be honest, not many were even close. It was interesting to welcome teams here to our facility or travel into Michigan and play teams near the lake shore. I only took one trip into Michigan with the team, when we went to play at Edwardsburg. In that trip, I began to realize what a good team we had. Jonny Shenk played number one singles for us in that match because Luke had requested that he play some doubles. Jonny won his match over Edwardsburg number one, and then Ben Mast and Seth Krabill won there matches at two and three singles as well, and fairly easily. Kyle and Matthew Amstutz blanked Edwardsburg at number two doubles. What I realized was that we would have probably beaten the Eddies if we played our JV team against them.

A week later we played Niles, and had like 9 of our players gone on a missions trip. So we had to recruit two soccer players to come and play in the match for us so that we could field a team. It's funny to admit this, but I was really nervous because I wanted us to finish undefeated in this summer league. I saw it as sending a statement or something like that because neither Goshen nor NorthWood nor Jimtown had gone undefeated. So Femi Hollinger-Janzen joined Blake Shetler at number one doubles and Jared Miller (junior) joined Matt Ebersole at number two doubles. And we were able to win. Okay, admittedly we won all the singles positions, Jonny Shenk again winning at one, Daniel Buschert winning at two, and Matthew Amstutz winning at three.

It was awesome to be able to dip into our JV team and below and still win matches. The truth was that our lower guys were just that good. It made me wish that we had played the whole season Michigan style, which counts four singles spots and four doubles spots. We have such depth that it would have made an incredible difference in our season. In fact, here's what our scores would have been including one singles JV, combining two and three singles as the third doubles team, and then number one JV doubles as the last spot.

The season scores if we had played Michigan style:

vs. Northridge - Tie, 4-4
vs. Goshen - Win, 7-1
vs. Rochester - Win, 8-0
vs. Concord - Tie, 4-4
vs. Jimtown - Win, 7-1
vs. Mishawaka - Win, 8-0
vs. Fremont - Win, 8-0
vs. Prairie Heights - Win, 8-0
vs. Triton - Win, 8-0
vs. Churubusco - Win, 8-0
vs. NorthWood - Win, 6-2
vs. Lakeland - Win, 8-0
vs. Westview - Win, 5-3
vs. Concord - Win, 5-3
vs. Fairfield - Win, 8-0
vs. Bremen - Win, 8-0
vs. Penn - Win, 6-2
vs. Fairfield (Sectional) - Win, 6-2
vs. NorthWood (Sectional) - Win, 6-2
vs. East Noble - Who Knows

TOTAL RECORD WITH MICHIGAN RULES: at least 17-0-2

Pretty awesome depth eh? Okay, so admittedly some things might have gone different, but still. That depth became evident in the summer, and that was something that excited me as a coach but it was also scary. It meant that we were going to have multiple people competing for varsity spots. That can push people to improve but it can also fracture team unity. Filling out lineup cards can become a nightmare when everybody is so good.

Especially for me. I don't like disappointing people who have worked hard, and I really worried about making the right choices. So as the summer wore on, and I began to see how close the competition was going to be for the varsity spots, I started to pray for separation. I wanted players to clearly show that they deserved the chance to play in varsity competition all year. I wanted to escape the struggle and the hard work come season time. But that wasn't going to be. We were too good all the way down through the JV (admittedly, I didn't know how good until the season actually unfolded, but I was starting to get an idea).

So the team's identity and strengths were beginning to become more evident, and the season was getting closer.

P.S. For those of you wondering where team camp fits into the summer, it gets it's own post...stay tuned.

The Season: Part Four

I'm never really prepared for the crazy cruise control of the spring. In the classroom, projects are rushed in to be done by the end of May, students are done being students from Spring Break on, and I find myself itching to move on. We've started taking a vacation right after school let's out, going to Florida, and that represents kind of like a goal for me.

Actually, a good way to describe the spring is like a new baby beginning to walk. My son Gideon is ten and a half months old and able to stand, just starting to try walking. What he does is stand up and identify his target destination, then looks at other parts of the room to see how he can get there. See, he can only take like two or three falling steps at a time, then he has to grab onto something or he will fall. So, he'll start grabbing onto the couch, then fall forward and grab onto my knee, then work his way around me and lunge for our chair, then finally gets to his goal and picks up the little play giraffe and stuffs the head in his mouth. I don't exactly have the same goals, but I take the same stumbling steps. My week off is one of those things that I stumble towards, and spring is always my time of stumbling.

As a team, we were going in so many different directions. Jeremy, Johnny, Mikey, Russell, Kyle were all playing and focusing on baseball. Jared, Jonny, Luke, Matthew and Daniel were eitehr taking lessons or at least trying to play a lot. JV guys were starting to come out and play more, as Austin, Ben and Seth became more dedicated. We were changing lots of things, giving Austin and Ben new service motions, working on Jonny's passing shots, trying to get Jared to stay positive and move his feet, trying not to lose too badly to Luke.

But with not having a consistent day on our courts because of girl's practice, trying to run middle school open gyms for soccer, tennis, and basketball, and trying to schedule times for us to run and lift weights; the spring seemed really scattered. I thought we were coming apart at the seams. I just wanted to get to my Florida trip and regroup for the summer.

It's amazing to me that we came out of this time without disillusionment. That unraveling feeling is hard to fight, so it is unbelievable that it didn't overtake everything. But I think that speaks back to the security that we all found in the vision. It wasn't short term, and their was a definite end point. Just like my son tripping and bumbling his way over to his favorite toy, the spring was a season of small, scattered steps. But we were able to reestablish ourselves at the end of that frenzied time, and look forward to the final goal we all had in mind.