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Leave everything we have on the court
In four seasons as the head tennis coach at Duke, Jamie Ashworth has guided the Blue Devils to four Atlantic Coast Conference championships and three appearances in the NCAA final four. Duke returns five of six starters.. Check out Ashworth's every other week on CNNSI.com.
April 17, 2001
Well, April 18, 2001 means it is time for another Atlantic Coast Conference tennis tournament. I guess you can see that historically Duke has done well in this event. We have won the last thirteen ACC tournaments and thirteen overall. People always ask what is like to win that many, and I always give the same answer. We haven't. As a coach I have been a part of seven of these championships. As players nobody on our team has been a part of more than three. So, that being the case, yes it is exciting for us, yes we expect to play well, and if we do that hopefully the results will take care of themselves.
The one thing that worries me as our post season begins is our play in doubles. We have now switched our doubles teams around for the ACC tournament, and I hope that shows our team that no matter where we are in the season we can't tolerate lack luster performances in doubles. In basketball, coaches say they play the first half to get to the second, in tennis right now I feel we are just playing the doubles to get to the singles. This to me is the wrong approach. As we enter the conference tournament and then in a few weeks the NCAA tournament, we need to be playing the doubles to take pressure off of our singles. We need to be playing doubles to win a point. I can tell you it is a heck of a lot easier to win three singles matches than it is to win four. It is unsettling as a coach to have to mix things up right as post season begins. Coach K did it when Carlos Boozer broke his foot and their end result was successful, hopefully ours will be too. Heading into post season play, Duke is coming off of its most successful season ever in women's tennis. We now stand 21-1 and are still ranked number two in the country. As all coaches say, we have put ourselves in a position to do good things over the next six weeks, now we need to take advantage of that situation. The road to the final four begins in Orlando this Thursday when we play Maryland in the ACC tournament. Hopefully we can follow the path of the Duke basketball team and leave everything we have on the court over the next six weeks. If we do, that is all anybody can ask of us.
-- Coach Ashworth
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