A positive outlook is important for the Butler women’s tennis team as they begin their season.
Butler women’s tennis had their first home game this Saturday against Milwaukee. The Bulldogs emerged victorious with the final outcome 6-1.
With it being so early in the season, the Bulldogs have hope for more wins like these coming their way. The Bulldogs have had mixed outcomes, their overall current record is 3-4.
The hope is high for the team considering most of their Big East matches are later in the season. The Bulldogs have plenty of time to focus on the strategies needed to pull out more wins.
Butler University sophomore Emily Neal was in a tough singles match today against Milwaukee senior Alexandra Belle. While playing, Belle was shouting negative comments at herself when she would lose points, and positive comments when Neal would gain points.
Neal continued to play and won the match.
When describing what her thoughts were, Neal said, “Whenever she was yelling really loud, you know I just thought to myself, ‘you know what, you can’t control that.’ You just need to move on and control what you can. I just tried to think positive the whole time and as you saw, it worked.”
Negative comments were not the only words being shouted during the matches. Members of the Butler Women’s Tennis team were encouraging their teammates.
Assistant coach Rachel Sutton explains how they do their best as a coaching staff to bring positive attitude to every practice.
Neal believes her win was not just from her skill but also her attitude she brought to the court. Belle already started the match with negativity when she would yell.
“Coming up we are going to have some winnable matches, which will be good for confidence as we go into Big East play. So yeah, we are just ramping up right now to see what we need to do and changes we need to make,” said Sutton.
Toward the end, there were two matches left on courts one and three. The rest of the team made a line on court two and cheered on their teammates, flipping back and forth as both Bulldogs finished their last matches.
The Dawgs’ season has been a mixed bag so far with four losses and three wins. However, with Milwaukee being the their first visiting opponent and a team that pushed them to keep a positive attitude, Butler’s win looks promising for the future.
