How to Help the Best NCAA Tennis Players Go to Professional Level
I received the following opinion from the former NCAA and now ATP tennis player Will Boe. Let’s read and discuss it.
How to Help the Best NCAA Tennis Players Go to Professional Level
I’m currently ranked around 1000 in the world on the ATP/ITF computer (which in 2013-2014 means having 11 ATP points).
I turned 30 in November and have been playing tennis since age 5…coaching started at 7. My tennis history is too long to illustrate here, but suffice it to say I’ve trained and coached for a long time, all over the world.
My point in writing this post is that I believe the NCAA is an untapped and under-valued market for the USTA player development.
I won an NCAA DIII singles championship my senior year at Bates College and didn’t get so much as an email or a phone call from the USTA inviting me or encouraging me to come and train at a training center.
After graduating, I didn’t know how or what to do in terms of “going pro,” all I knew was that I was #1 in New England as an 18 yr old, was #1 in DIII as a 22 yr old and wanted to become a professional tennis player. I knew I needed to make training my job and had to raise my level up significantly if I wanted to compete with the best in the world. I knew I needed help, but there was nobody there to help.
I think the USTA player development office needs to automatically enroll or invite the top NCAA DI-III players to their regional/national training centers. Give them 6-12 months of free room, board, and training. After the 6-12 months, make an assessment. Which players are advancing and which ones aren’t? Cut the losers and keep the winners.
The top 100 is getting older and older. The days of teens in the top 10 is gone forever. The USTA needs to stop gambling with millions of dollars on one player and hope he/she becomes a grand slam champion and instead focus on developing dozens of players into top 100 level and then maybe one of those players will rise up above the rest and become a champion.
I strongly believe that a 6-12 month rigorous, professional level training program specifically targeting the top 20 DI, top 10 DII and top 4 DIII singles players (men and women) will be a big help in not only bringing together some of the country’s best collegiate players, but also provide some educated and more mature players to the training environments at the predominately junior filled tennis training centers.
Cheers, Will Boe
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Will
Thank you for writing about your experience, it is indeed a tough market out there. Your experience should be shared with all. The problem is that it is a numbers game, and the USTA does only take the absolute best players and does cut them if they do not fit or progress, I guess that there are plenty of DI and DII players that make their cut according to their budget.
Remember to make a living as a pro you need to break the top 100 and stay there. problem is that the 100 slots are very tough to get, and once the players get a spot it is very difficult to let them go. just look at the top 10, very few changes in last 5-8 years. top 20, a little movement but really few changes, top 50 it is kind of the same. In other words there are 100 jobs and 3000 applicants, and those 100 jobs don’t open up for years.
Good point. But instead of getting the players after graduating from college into a training regime why not do that for 3-5 years after they finish their junior career and then see who is ready for the tour and who should go to college.
United States looses lots of good juniors for college tennis and very few ( 1-5 percent ) of seniors take on the tennis tour after graduating. It is very simple, you can look all stats and none will show that going to college will help you going pro.
Tennis is a world sports, Americans are trying to use rules and lifestyle from other American sports and use in tennis. How much a number 10 football player is going get paid after college and compare that to tennis.
If you want to become a professional tennis player you have to grind it out and suffer working hard for years, and you might not even make. There will be no pamper and free food until you break top 50.
I cannot understand why educated people can’t figure out that college is not the road for the professional tour. Players have to easy of a life in college and that’s why lots of good top college players go work after graduating instead of playing tennis. They want make money, they don’t want to suffer until their 30s to make money.
when you are young and full of energy is so much easier to endure all of you need to do for a few years in order to become pro than when you are 25 after graduating from college. Don’t we all heard school teachers and successful people telling us to follow our dreams while you are young….
WE ALL CAN BECOME DOCTORS AT AGES 35,40,50s but ONE CANT become Professional Tennis Players (top200) at those ages these days and PERIOD.
Players need help and guidance for sure but it has to start at 16-18
Every foreigner player that is at the top of their countries juniors ranking are traveling out of the country and state playing all kinds of money, junior and ITF tournaments. Getting the experience they need to decide to go Pro for a few years. Here in the United States most juniors are just playing inside their own state, and Some top players never left the country.
United States is the only country in the world with top college sports programs compare to any other country but unfortunately doesn’t work for tennis where to play, compete and be the best you need to travel All over the world and compete with hungrier players.
“The top 100 is getting older and older. The days of teens in the top 10 is gone forever. The USTA needs to stop gambling with millions of dollars on one player and hope he/she becomes a grand slam champion and instead focus on developing dozens of players into top 100 level and then maybe one of those players will rise up above the rest and become a champion.”
Like.
And I would be willing to bet that any sort of data analysis of other “clusters of excellence” (Men: Spain, All the current French come to mind) would suggest that’s a positive strategy.
I truly beleived in most cases it is too late after college. Time do not play favor for tennis players and no one has a crystal ball on how each player will do on the pro tour. However, if your intension is to play pro, I think your train and development should be done well before college. Honestly, playing college and the pros takes a totally different approach. Many college coaches will actually ruin your pro game instead of helping. In college, you are encourage to stay in the point and the pros you need to be able to dictate and finish the point. College will always be there and making it to top level pros; you may only get one chance in your lifetime if you good enough.