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Freshman Annie McCarthy
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April 2, 2008
In the 11th edition of the Illini 2008 Blog, freshman Annie McCarthy describes the Illinois women's tennis team's red hot start in the Big Ten season, as well as facing No. 1 Northwestern and having some fun off the court.
"A Wise man once said that your opponent is only as good as you make them"--Dave Emery. This was the pearls of wisdom that Dave imparted on us only minutes before our Big Ten match against Northwestern the #1 team in the Nation. Although we were all fully aware that we would be playing our toughest opponents yet, we were calm, relaxed, and ready to battle.
Let's take it back a few days, to what I like to call Limbo. Is practice inside or outside? What will the weather be like this weekend? Should I wear a hoodie and a coat? Should I wear a hoodie, a long sleeve, and a coat? Am I going to get all 10 study hours in? Just a few questions posed prior to our first weekend at home in what seems like an eternity. Glad to be back at school, but not glad to be back at class, we spent a few days practicing outdoors, and a few in, until the weekend finally came.
It was Friday night and we had huge plans. Dance Practice. We don't want to give too much away, but let's just say that we have to do a dance for a new program called Jock Jams where all the proceeds go to charity. Each athletic team has to prepare some sort of skit or dance to perform for each other, our peers, and the community. We met in the basement of the dorms (finally everyone came to OUR place to hang out...). Marisa and I decided to dress up in ridiculous outfits in order to make even larger fools of ourselves. After an extremely satisfying practice, we were ready to get to sleep and as Michelle tells us to "spend the last 5 minutes before you go to bed visualizing winning your match".
A few days before our match, we sent out a Facebook event invitation stating that we were 2-0 in the Big Ten, and if people came to our match, we would be 3-0. Well, looks like their presence was our recipe for success. Back at home with the Nation's 3rd biggest Women's Tennis crowd we were ready to prove to the Big Ten that we are a threat to any team. Clenching all six singles matches to defeat Wisconsin 6-1, I'm going to go ahead and say we did just that.
After spending Saturday night recouping and visualizing it was time to take on the Wildcats. Although the score may not show it, we played our hearts out, and battled with everything we had. I like to think that we scared the Wildcats a little and proved that we are out to win this season.
Well as much as I would LOVE to stay and chat, we have 6:45 practice tomorrow morning before we leave for our weekend at Michigan and Penn State. Thanks for reading!
Go Illini!
--Annie
