Photo courtesy of goxavier.com | Sophomore Brett Winters wants to keep the same mindset and hold a positive attitude in his second season at Xavier. During the offseason, Winters improved his fitness level to stay in shape for competition. .
Following a freshman season that saw him pick up 12 wins in singles play and 14 wins in doubles play, Brett Winters is looking to build on that success in his sophomore year.
Winters, a sophomore from River Vale, N.J., was Xavier’s first signee of the 2017-18 recruiting class and was ranked as a four-star recruit by tennisrecruiting.net.
Last year, seven of Winters’ 12 wins came out of the second flight. This year, Winters’ made the move up a rank to the first flight.
“The biggest adjustment so far has been to keep the same mindset, keep a positive attitude and have the confidence in myself that I’ll be able to play at whatever level I’m put at,” Winters said. “I worked a ton (on) fitness, not as much tennis, but a lot of fitness to get in shape to be able to play against every single person.”
Winters swept the first flight in Xavier’s season-opening tournament, the Greater Cincinnati Invitational, which was hosted at the Lindner Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio — the same location the Western and Southern Open of the ATP Tour is held.
Winters beat Louisville’s Clement Filho in three sets and then finished off Paul Gota of Notre Dame, also in three sets.
His biggest test of the day came against Dayton’s Benjamin Jordan who came into the match ranked No. 77 in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s 2018-19 season rankings.
Winters dropped the first set but rallied to take the second set and the superset to win the match.
“It was a big accomplishment for me,” Winters said about his performance. “It felt really good especially after some struggles last year winning matches, so it kind of felt like a little bit of a relief, but I also expected to have some really good results, and I was just glad to have it done in Cincinnati.”
At the Dayton Hidden Duals last weekend, Winters picked up a win in singles play — one of 13 singles wins for the team — against Dayton’s Langford Hills.
Winters and his doubles partner, junior Jack Dykema, also won a match against Wright State’s Fernando Nardelli and Javier de la Villa, securing one of five doubles wins for the team. Xavier picked up 18 total wins against the likes of Dayton, Wright State and Northern Kentucky.
“Brett worked extremely hard over the summer,” head coach Doug Matthews said. “He deserves to play well because he works so hard and cares so much. He has shown he can beat anyone, he just needs to work on being consistent every match.”
Next up for the Musketeers is the ITA Ohio Valley Regional Championships, which are set to take place from Oct. 11-15 in Knoxville, Tenn. The event will be hosted by the University of Tennessee at the Goodfriend Tennis Center.
By: Joe Clark | Guest Writer