Who's Hot?
Prince Hot 100 List - May '13
by Amelia Thomas, 20 May 2013
Share: | |
| | |
|
|
The 2013 NCAA Tennis Championships are now through to the semifinals, and all eyes are on Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, and the Atkins Tennis Center. The men's semifinals take place at 2pm Eastern / 11am Pacific, while the women play at 6pm Eastern / 3pm Pacific. You can catch all the action online - the University of Illinois is providing streaming video for all courts.
But while today's focus is the NCAA Championships, May is a time when nice weather abounds and tennis picks up. Some of the junior players who competed at a high level over the past month appear in this edition of the Prince Hot 100.
The Prince Hot 100 lists are published each month, and the May Hot 100 lists feature the one hundred boys and girls who most improved their ranking during the month of April. You can find out more about the Prince Hot 100 - and how the lists are calculated - by reading here.
The latest lists, published this past week, are now available:
We checked in with a few of these players...
Roundup
Kasey Countee (Cheltenham, Md.)
Three-star junior Kasey Countee cites his recent decision to focus mainly on tennis as the origin of his success last month. Throughout freshman and sophomore year, Countee played soccer, basketball and tennis.
"After numerous conversations with my coaches about dedicating myself to tennis and knowing I wanted to play in college, tennis is my focus," Countee said. "Each coach has told me that committing to playing tennis would pay off."
It appears that Countee's coaches were right. Last month, he competed in a Mid Atlantic States Challenger, in Virginia Beach, reaching the finals. This achievement pushed him up over 150 spots on the Class Rankings List.
Countee considers himself an all-around player. "I don't like the traditional tennis game where two kids are just hitting the ball twenty times back and forth to see who misses first," he said. "I want to be the one dictating points with my serve, movement and net game."
The Cheltenham native is close to his coach, Steve Miguel of the Bullis School. As the number one player for his high school tennis team, Countee values the relationship players grow with their team and coaches.
Countee is looking for this same atmosphere in college. "I am looking for a coach that can push me so I can reach my full potential," he said. "I want a coach who is able and willing to look at my tennis ability and not just my ranking, a coach who knows what type of player he is getting and not just what number ranking he just picked up."