The Bakersfield College women’s tennis team started their season on Jan 15. The team is under the leadership of first year coach Gene Lundquist.
Lundquist comes to the Renegades after spending 35 years at Calcot, LTD where he was their vice president and corporate secretary. Lundquist was hired to coach the team during the summer and has been recruiting girls from high school to come out for the team next year before the start of the season.
Lundquist listed several goals for his team this year. “My goal is to better and improve the individual skills of all the women who come out for the team,” Lundquist said. “Another goal is to teach them how to be competitive and how to win. Lastly, I want to take an individual sport and mold that into a team.”
Lundquist said that these goals are a work in progress but he is very encouraged so far. Lundquist highlighted the strengths and weaknesses of this year’s team; one of the weaknesses he mentioned was not having enough players come out for the team this year. “Our weakness is that we are not at full strength all the time,” Lundquist said. “We have six full-time players and two returnees who can only play the home matches because of class schedules.”
According to Lundquist, the team has a tremendous amount of enthusiasm and athleticism. “In the short time they have been out here I see substantial improvement from every one of them,” Lundquist said.
Lundquist said he was pleased with the team’s performance in their first match of the season against College of Sequoias when his top two players Jamie Mitchell and Amie Cowan were playing doubles; they came back from a 4-1 deficit. Another highlight has been the play of Jacqueline Lebeck. “She has been particularly good in her singles matches,” added Lundquist.
The women’s tennis team will host Ventura College at 2 p.m. March 8.