If you play USTA league tennis long enough, you collect a lot of stories. Some are about heartbreaking losses. Some are about close friends. And, if you’re lucky, one or two are about moments so improbable and perfect that they almost don’t feel real.
For me, that’s the weekend we won the USTA National Championship.
The story really started months earlier when I found myself paired with Keri. She had always played with another partner, but an injury forced a change, and suddenly we were paired up. Sometimes doubles teams struggle to find chemistry. We never did. Our games complemented each other from the very beginning. We trusted each other, communicated well, and somehow always seemed to know what the other was thinking.
The funny thing is that while we were becoming a great doubles team, we were also becoming great friends. Tennis has a way of doing that. By the end of the season, I couldn’t imagine being on that journey with anyone else.
And what a journey it was.
Winning the Dallas City Championships is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in tennis. People who don’t play league tennis in Dallas can’t fathom how many outstanding players we have. I’d been on several teams that made it to Cities only to see our season end there.
This time was different.
That season, our team finally broke through. We won Cities. Then Regionals (and honestly, Regionals was easier). Suddenly, we were Nationals-bound.
Nationals were held in Tucson, where teams from across the country were competing. Every match was a dogfight, but still, we found ourselves in the finals.
Matches consist of five lines: two singles and three doubles.
The first doubles line finished and won. I remember looking down the court and seeing the celebration.
A little later, the second doubles line won too. At that point, I started doing the math. We had two points. Then I looked at the singles courts.
Both singles lines were losing.
Suddenly it became clear: the national championship was probably going to come down to us.
Our match had been a battle from the first ball. We had won the first set by the slimmest of margins. The second set was just as tight, and we were heading into a tiebreak.
I’ve competed in plenty of tennis matches, but I’ve never felt pressure like that. I became so nervous that I could barely swing. Every ball felt heavier. Every point felt enormous.
Meanwhile, Keri transformed into some sort of superhuman version of herself. “Our team needs us!” she said. Which, if I’m being honest, made me even more nervous.
To this day, I don’t really know how we won that tiebreak. My memories are mostly a blur of tension and survival. I remember trying not to miss. I remember Keri carrying us through critical moments. I remember feeling like my racket weighed fifty pounds.
And then, at 9-8, it happened.
A ball came toward me. I watched it travel. For a split second, everything slowed down. I looked down and saw that it was out.
Match over.
National champions.
I’ve never felt such a strange combination of happiness and relief. Not joy first, relief first. The pressure vanished instantly. All the years of coming up short at Cities. All the close matches. All the practices. All the nerves. Gone.
Every tennis player dreams about having one perfect weekend.
That was mine.
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