OPINION: Game, set, match

For the second year in a row, as spring sports start to show their head, I offer my help to Cheyenne in taking photos for sports. Unlike the rest of the year, I have a little experience in track and tennis, so I know what to look for.

However, like last year, I’ve been getting confused. Apparently Iowa just does sports differently than Wisconsin, specifically tennis.

To start off with the most obvious difference, girls tennis in Iowa is at a completely different time of year than in Wisconsin. At my high school, fall sports are cheer and stunt, cross country, dance team, football, girls golf, boys soccer, girls tennis and volleyball. In the spring is baseball, boys golf, lacrosse, girls soccer, softball, boys tennis and track.

You might also notice, the sports typically found in Iowa’s summer season are during the spring in Wisconsin. We don’t have a summer season. To be honest, I didn’t even know some states even had a fourth season.

Aside from girl’s tennis being in what I consider the wrong season, the whole team setup is different here too.

In my mind, a varsity tennis team is pretty regimented. There are 10 athletes on a varsity tennis team, four of whom are singles players and six of whom are doubles players. The athletes play a variety of matches with each other to establish rank. At any time in the season, one athlete could challenge another to take their place, including JV players challenging varsity players.

Often times the the top three players are in the top three singles positions, but not always. The athletes get to chose which position they play in order of their rank. The fourth ranked person will often switch to No. 1 doubles team, as the fourth-ranked singles and third-ranked doubles teams don’t qualify for sectionals or state.

While I was ranked third on my team for a little while, I preferred doubles. I think it’s much more fun to play with another person, and it’s easier to play at the net when you have someone to back you up if you miss. Since I stuck with doubles, when someone challenged me for third and won, I was able to stay in my position at No. 1 doubles, as they wanted No. 3 singles.

Another difference I found shocking was the scoring. For those not acquainted with how scoring in tennis works, here’s a quick overview from the U.S. Tennis Association:

• 0 points= Love
• 1 point = 15
• 2 points= 30
• 3 points= 40
• Tied score= All
• 40-40 = Deuce
• Server wins deuce point = Ad-In
• Receiver wins deuce point = Ad-Out

“In order to win the game, a player must win at least four points. If you are up 40-30, 40-15 or 40-love, and win one more point, you win the game. If the score is tied in a game or set, you use the term “all” when announcing the score. For example, if you and your opponent have both won two points in the game, the score would be 30-all.”

So that’s how you win a game in tennis. However, a game is only part of the whole match. You need to win so many games to win a set, and so many sets to win the whole match, hence the term “game, set, match.”

Normally, (and by normally I mean by both Wisconsin and USTA standards), you need to win six games to win a set and two out of three sets to win the match. The only time that changes is if a high school game isn’t conference or it’s a JV game and the schools want to be done quickly, or in professional tennis, in which men’s singles matches at Grand Slam tournaments play best of five sets rather than best of three.

Considering this is how I learned to play tennis in Wisconsin and it’s how all the professionals played on T.V., I expected everyone to play like this. Then I came to Iowa.

Apparently, Iowa teams don’t play “game, set, match.” They get rid of sets altogether. Instead, tennis matches are won when one player wins eight games. When I first heard about this, I was surprised. That was a very short amount of time to play tennis compared to normal.

However, when I found out that a varsity tennis team generally has their athletes play both singles and doubles back-to-back, it made a little more sense. They still play quite a bit of tennis between the two matches.

In general, though, I find the changes confusing. Why change scoring when the rest of the country, rest of the world does it a different way?

On a completely different note, check out the courts at the Sears Sports Complex. They’re newly refurbished and look like they’d be awesome to play on.