Marc Vecchiolla has been coaching the Mercer women’s tennis team ever since the program returned from an 11-year hiatus in 1997. Unfortunately, coach is one of the only experienced positions on this team.
This year’s roster only consists of six players, which is enough to fill a tennis teams’ starting lineup. Two players on the team are completely new to the game, and Salomey Owusu and Nataly Hernandez are the team’s’ only returning players. Freshman Valerie Gapco, who was a Nottingham High tennis stand out last year, will take over as the team’s number one player.
“It’s going to be a very challenging year for us. We just want the girls to have a lot of fun, work hard, and not really be so results based oriented in terms of wins and losses.” said Vecchiolla.
In 2012, the team finished third in the region tournament with an overall record of 5 and 4. This year’s team will try for similar success, but they’ll have to do so without Eva Szyszko, who was the team’s number one player last year.
Vecchiolla remains optimistic about this year’s inexperienced team, saying, “we’ll work a lot on the basics and hopefully a month from now when the region tournament starts, we’ll be much improved compared to where we are today.”
