The past four matches haven’t been the easiest for the Syracuse tennis team. After starting the season 7-0, the Orange has lost three of its last four contests and is looking to regain the form it showed amid its undefeated streak And, it might be traveling to the perfect place to do it: Florida.

‘We’ve been playing indoors for probably six months now and to get outside is going to be really nice,’ junior Ashley Spicer said. ‘Getting down there a week before we play two outdoor matches is huge to get used to the conditions again.’

Syracuse will travel to the Sunshine State to take on Florida International on March 12 and Big East foe South Florida on March 15. Syracuse will leave on Saturday to train in Florida in what head coach Luke Jensen calls ‘Camp Hell.’

Despite its recent slump, Syracuse has played well in the doubles portion of its matches, capturing the doubles point in three of the last four contests. In singles, though, the Orange has struggled, dropping 16 of 24 matches.

Jensen said execution has been a problem for the team recently, particularly in hitting the final shot to close out a point, despite the Orange having a high percentage of first serves. When that happens, he said the team loses confidence in its game.

‘We’ve been really talking to the team about trust,’ Jensen said. ‘Trust your training, trust the coaching staff, trust the system, trust yourself. Have the inner confidence that you may be missing and this is a bad patch but you stay persistent and you keep going forward.’

Syracuse has a 10-day break between matches before facing Florida International. The reprieve will give the Orange a chance to rejuvenate itself and assess its status at the halfway point of the season.

In the early portion of the season, Syracuse feasted on weaker competition, including two Big East road wins over Cincinnati and West Virginia. But more road matches and some tougher competition caused the Orange to falter. SU has since lost to Iowa State, Rutgers and Army.

‘We started off the beginning of the season really, really well and I think as we’ve started to play some better teams it’s obviously more challenging,’ Spicer said. ‘I think we just need to rise to the occasion and really make sure that as a team we come together.’

SU has a chance to change its shape over the next 10 days. South Florida finished in the top five in the Big East last season, but is 1-7 this year. Defeating a ranked team (Florida International is ranked 56th) and another Big East opponent would give the Orange momentum going into the final stretch of the season, where it will face seven conference foes, five on the road.

The Orange was rolling at the beginning of the season because it typically claimed the doubles point and used that confidence to take down its opponents in the singles matches. In the past few contests, though, Syracuse has had to work harder in the doubles and endure longer matches, which makes it harder to dominate the singles phase.

Jensen said that exams and the pressures of classes have affected the team in recent weeks as well. But Jensen said his players will not have to worry about midterms over the break and will be more focused.

‘That’s such a huge part of being a student-athlete here is making sure that part of our life, a very huge part of our life, is taken care of and then everything falls into place,’ Jensen said.

While the trip to Florida will certainly not be a vacation for the Orange, the team is still looking forward to escaping the cold and snow in favor of high temperatures and sunnier cities.

Said Spicer, ‘It’ll be great to get away.’

azmeola@syr.edu

Published on March 4, 2009 at 12:00 pm