Things have been trending upward for the UT Permian Basin men's tennis team for the 2024 spring season. The team is currently 6-1 overall, which is the best start in program history.

"It feels good," said Head Coach Alex Hunt on being 6-1. "Joshua Lopez (assistant coach) and I focus more on the wins and losses, while the players focus on their individual goals, like improving certain strokes and their confidence. I feel like that approach has gone so well. When you have a group of guys that are talented and not really be focused on the wins and losses the wins will just come." 

The Falcons rattled off six straight wins including victories over NCAA Division III #17 Southwestern 9-0, NAIA #20 Our Lady of the Lake 4-3, and picking up the programs first ever win over Southeastern Oklahoma State 6-1. The team then suffered a tough 4-3 loss to Southern Arkansas. 

Mixing things up 

While having talented players helps when it comes to racking up wins, it also helps when a program has a coaching staff that is willing to change things up.

"This year Josh and I split duties as far as planning practice is concerned so that the team hears two different voices. They get two different perspectives and get different feedback to think about," said Hunt. "I feel like that keeps things fresh at practice." 

Coach Hunt also said they ask players about what productive trainings they have done in their hometowns or countries that have helped them. They try to incorporate those ideas into their practices.  

"It really has been a group effort and that has been really cool to see," said Hunt. 

This year coach Hunt has also made a change to the structure of their double's pairings, which has paid off so far this season.  

"We've pretty much made a decision that we are going to split up our ITA Champions doubles team in order to increase our depth on the doubles side of things. That is something I wouldn't have ever thought to do last year," said Hunt. "It's proven to be very successful. Jonas Krahofer and Takumi Katsuda can pair with anybody and then we welcomed in Jonathan Vega, a transfer this year, and he can also play with anyone. So, we have all three of them on different courts, which means we have three very high-level doubles teams. In years past, I don't know if I would have done that, but through a lot of great conversations with the guys we decided this strategy would be the best route to secure doubles point every match." 

That strategy has proven to be very successful, as they have yet to lose the doubles point this year. 

Preparing for home matches 

After traveling for 18 straight matches, the Falcons will finally be home starting tomorrow (Feb. 23), when they host Western New Mexico at the Permian H.S. Courts at 9 a.m. 

"I'm super excited to be home because I kind of get to relax a little more," said Hunt. "I just focus on the match, hiring the official, and taking care of the balls. I feel like Josh, and I are going to be able to focus a lot more on the tennis and not all the craziness that comes along with traveling." 

Following the conclusion of Friday's match, the Falcons will host Texas A&M-Texarkana (Mar. 1, 9 AM), Sul Ross State (Mar. 1, 2 PM) and Seward County CC (Mar. 2, 9 AM). Those games will be played at the Bush Tennis Center in Midland.  

"I feel like once people start taking notice and understanding that this is a very high-level sport, hopefully these home matches can feel like home matches and not neutral site matches," said Hunt. "That's going to be our goal, just create some excitement, create the results we want to see, and hopefully people will take notice and come out and support us."