In the past couple of years, the SHS girls tennis team has had multiple different head coaches leading the team. This season will mark the team’s third year in a row with a new head coach. This season, the girls will be lead by head coach Tyler Scanlan.

Despite coaching changes and the frustration that may come along with that, the team has still found success.

In the 2015 season, coached by Harry Schwartz, the team won sectionals. The following year, the team won sectionals again under the leadership of coach Jordan Cross.

Junior Jenna Polly thinks that the team could add another winning season to their belts despite the loss of seniors. So far, the team has shown good signs of achieving that by starting off the season with four straight wins.

According to Polly, there are some frustrations with coaches walking in and out on the team.

“You get used to having a coach and you get to know what they do… but then you get a new coach and they do a totally different thing,” Polly said.

Polly says that because of the inconsistency of the coaches, the mental aspect of the game is changed and the team relies more on each other than they do the coach.

On the other side, senior Megan Sullivan thinks the coaching changes aren’t a big deal.

“Really nothing has changed at all, it’s just the coach,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan agrees with Polly in the sense that the team relies on each other but she also thinks the coach plays a big role as well.

Scanlan has had experience coaching at different schools. He’s coached at Franklin Central High School, Marion University, and last year he was an assistant coach at SHS. Scanlan says his experience in coaching in different places helps him a lot.

“…that’s enabled me to see what I like from all of them and then add it into what I want to incorporate,” Scanlan said.

This season, Scanlan is focusing on incorporating one main thing: the play of the ball, which is just being able to get the ball going back and forth between the opponents from a serve.

“The main thing to focus on is getting the ball into play, that’s our main strategy.”