Tennis will start the 2024-25 season this Friday at the Bedford Cup with a young roster and a focus on building confidence ahead of the spring season.
The season’s seven-person roster consists of three returning sophomores, three freshmen and one returning senior after four athletes on last year’s 10-person team graduated in the spring. Head Coach George Rodriguez, who led the team to finish with a record of 6-15 and a 4-6 Atlantic 10 record last season, said the young squad has a strong desire to show off their skillset and improve.
Rodriguez joined the Revs in 2022 after coaching Division II Fresno Pacific for two seasons. His team achieved the highest cumulative GPA, 3.88, among all GW athletic teams last spring.
“What I like about having a young team is that they’re open to buying into the process,” Rodriguez said, “That was a challenge as I came in with a team that has been with a different coach.”
He said he wants to focus on players’ confidence this season, particularly since underclassmen make up the majority of the roster.
“Confidence is a big issue for us and me this year, the focus is just keeping everything simple, really focusing on the quality of what we’re doing, not the quantity of it, but just focusing on the confidence of each player,” Rodriguez said.
The Revs made the A-10 tournament last season with a 16-5 record but fell to Richmond in the first round. The team also beat A-10 rival George Mason in a late March meetup in Fairfax, Virginia, followed up with a win against Davidson on March 29. The Revs went on to vanquish crosstown rival Georgetown 4-3 on April 5.
Alum Stella Wiesemann will also join Rodriguez as an assistant coach this season. She attained a 13-5 singles record in the 2022-23 season and achieved A-10 All-Conference First Teams in each of her four seasons.
Rodriguez said Wiesemann’s expertise and bond she built with her team when she was an athlete allows her to further connect with team members, while also understanding their competition. As a captain last season, Wiesemann was the sole player to participate in the singles main draw in the ITA Atlantic Regional Championships, where she defeated then-No. 6 seed Melodie Collard, prior to falling to Virginia Tech in the next round.
“She played for us the last couple years,” Rodriguez said. “She’s played every top player in our conference, so she understands that aspect of competition at that high level. She could help the team out overall, from our one player all the way down to our sixth player.”
Freshmen Vaida Matuseviciute, Karen Verduzco and Patricia Ungure-Rogozoveca are all joining the team as international students, hailing from Sweden, Mexico and Latvia, respectively. Verduzco had previously represented her home country at World Cup qualifiers in Montreal while Matuseviciute brings numerous under-18 and ITF championships during her time with the youth Swedish national team.
“The team has been great,” Matuseviciute said. “They’ve been very welcoming, and everyone has taken the time to really get to know us and spend time with us. I think they’re great girls.”
Senior Alejandra Ramirez said she serves as a captain and a mentor through her position as the only senior on the team. She said athletes trained over the summer to build up a “match rhythm” and also competed outside of the Revolutionaries team to build confidence and prepare to kick off their fall matches.
“It was really exciting having to take the role as the leader and captain and using everything that I’ve learned from my freshman year,” Ramirez said. “I’ve had different coaching experiences and just adapting and showing the girls what to do, what not to do, how to hang in there, academically and socially, and how to balance everything.”
Ramirez said their upcoming competition, the Bedford Cup, is her favorite, as she looks to set a strong precedent for the season, although she is still excited to compete against multiple rival schools like Georgetown and Davidson. With seven athletes competing in last year’s Bedford Cup, two placed first in their draws while then-senior Gabriela Giraldo earned second in the top singles Tiafoe draw, the tournament’s highest.
“You play from players from everywhere, Maryland, Howard, everyone comes,” Ramirez said. “It’s pretty fun.”
After competing at the Bedford Cup, the team will travel to Annapolis, Maryland, where they will play in the Navy-hosted Blue and Gold Invite.
