By Tyler Derrington

Last year, SU’s Men’s Tennis team finished with a 7 – 9 record, one of the better seasons in program history. While at first glance a losing record may not seem great, it did mark only the second time that the team made it to conference play, where they lost to Washington & Lee in the ODAC semifinals.

The 2018 squad also saw two players Darian Diaz and Matt Hwang be selected for the All-ODAC team.

Going into 2019 season Head Coach Hubbard is very optimistic and excited for what the future holds for the men’s tennis team.

Due to a diminished roster, this year can lead the Hornets to be ranked in the bottom third in the ODAC. Thus, making it to the conference playoffs just this past season.

Hubbard didn’t seem to worry about potentially being ranked in the bottom of the ODAC, going into the season with 7 players – leading Shenandoah to be one of the smallest teams in the ODAC. “Our goal is to win and represent Shenandoah in the conference play, but to also keep a positive attitude and stay true to themselves and accomplish their team goals off the courts as well as on the court” said Hubbard.

Most people don’t know Hubbard is going into his 9th season at Shenandoah as the head coach for both men and women tennis teams. He has over 30 years of tennis coaching experience and multiple coaching certificates. Prior to coaching at Shenandoah coach Hubbard was the head coach at Liberty University – a Division 1 (D1) organization.

With all his coaching experience and the experience of the players that are returning it’ll be hard to count out the Hornets.

What most people don’t know Is that coach Hubbard true love wasn’t always tennis, it was actually lacrosse. Hubbard attended and played D1 lacrosse at Maryland University where he won a national championship.

Coach Hubbard’s father is the one who actually introduced and influenced the game of tennis to him, and even then, tennis was only a past time. It wasn’t until Hubbard was out of school and at the beginning of his coaching career is when tennis became a big part of his life. As a college coach you have to be involved in a university in other ways other than coaching, so coach Hubbard turn to teach tennis and the story begins.